"Idol" chatter: Series changes messaging providers

The Seattle Times reports wireless marketing and branding solutions developer Mobilss is no longer the text messaging/viewer voting platform provider for the Fox network's blockbuster amateur showcase "American Idol." According to Mobliss, it bowed out of the series after informing carrier partner Cingular/AT&T last summer it planned to liquidate its messaging assets to focus on mobile gaming services. "We worked very successfully with Cingular over the past five years, and in an effort to focus on our mobile-gaming business, which we've been involved in for many years, we choose not to participate in the 'American Idol' program," Mobliss VP Tom Ederer told the paper, which reports that the "AI" messaging contract will now move to another Seattle firm, SinglePoint.

For more on Mobliss' "American Idol" exit:
- read this Seattle Times article

Related article:
- "American Idol" sets SMS record