• WHAT: A way to access information about everyday items from your cell phone so fast it will blow your mind
  
• WHY: Mobile browsers are good for browsing, not hunting
• COST: Free (carrier text messaging charges apply)

Since the days of the caveman there has been a fundamental division between the two ways of getting food - hunting and gathering.  Hunters go out with a goal and when it's completed they're done and come home.  Gatherers go out looking for whatever they can find and collect things along the way.  I'm told that it's the same today, metaphorically speaking, when people shop: men hunt and women gather.  It's a way of life and is, I believe, programmed into your DNA at birth. 

In today's world, though, there's little hunting and gathering for food - but the process has remained intact when hunting and gathering information (arguably today's food... for the mind).  Gathering is akin to looking for information on a browser, following links, seeing what you come across and enjoying the serendipitous discovery of something grand along the way.  But with a mobile device my experience is that you want to hunt - like a heat-seeking missile you want to go after one particular piece of information, get it quickly and be finished. 

After years of serving as the world's most visible spokesperson for WAP browsers (the technology that makes mobile browsing work) I'll be the first one to tell you that this isn't always the best way to get it done.  There is, in fact, a far better way through Google mobile... text messaging's version of the heat-seeking missile. 

This is a service that I use several times every day - and once you get accustomed to it, you will, too.  It's handy, addictive, incredibly fast (responses are typically within five seconds) and, like all things Google, free.  If by some chance you don't know how to send a text message (something that I should probably cover in a future post) this is reason enough to learn.

In an earlier post I described how I used this service to get definitions of words while reading the newspaper.  It's so fast to do it that way that I often just text the query to Google instead of getting up and going to the computer on my desk.   But there are so many other things that Google's SMS query service can do that I'm compelled to tell you about them here.  You'll soon agree that these are as addictive as popcorn. 

Send any of these queries - shown in quotes below - to 466453 (Google's own numeric "short code") for a speedy reply chock full of info.  Replace "91302" with your own zip code, or the zip code or city name of the place for which you want the information:

• Local listings for anything - Want pizza, sushi, auto repair, ATMs, florists or whatever for a particular area?  Send "pizza 91302"
• Weather for anywhere: Send "Weather 91302" or, even faster, just "w 91302"
  
• Flight updates: Get a flight update, including gate and terminal information, for any airline in any city, by sending the airline's name (or abbreviation, such as AA for American Airlines or UA for United) followed by the flight number, e.g., "AA 123" for a flight update on American Airlines flight number 123.
• Airline Information: Want the reservations phone number for any airline?  Just send the airline name, e.g., "United Airlines"
• Sports information: Get the latest score for your favorite sports team by sending the team name, e.g., "Yankees"
• Movies: (I love this one and use it all the time) Send the movie name and the zip code where you'd like to see it and get the locations, times, phone numbers of the theaters and even a quick rating (out of five stars) just by sending "Spiderman 91302"
• Stock quotes: Couldn't be easier - just send the ticker symbol, e.g., "AAPL"
• Glossary/Dictionary: Send "define wizard"
• Zip code with reverse directory: Send the zip code and get the city/state that it's in or send the name of a city and get the zip code for it, e.g., "91302" or "Calabasas CA"
• Translations: This one is almost too handy to believe.  Just send "Translate hello in French" and, voila, the translation comes right back from English to French. 
  
• Driving directions: I'm not a big fan of this one as it only gives you general directions but you might feel better about it than I do.  Send "pasadena ca to 91302".  Personally I much prefer TellMe for this application, which I've mentioned in another post.
• Web snippets: I don't use this one much but you might.  Send "g wireless" and you'll get some web-based information about wireless.  Too broad and non-specific for my taste.
• Q&A: Another one I love... just send a question in a query form for a quick answer.  It's a little tricky to get the right syntax so you might get frustrated trying to use this one, e.g., "birthday abraham lincoln" gets you the right answer but "population peoria il" does not. 
  
• Area code: I use this one every day.  When someone leaves me a message and I don't recognize the area code (which I want to know before I return a call at the wrong time of day - or night) I just send "407" or "area code fillmore ca" to get the information.
• Calculator and conversion: Convert pints to quarts, yards to miles, etc.  Send "convert 123456 feet to miles" (let me save you the math - it's 23.3818182 miles according to Google calculator).  I timed this answer, by the way... 1.5 seconds from the time I hit the "Send" button.  Incredible.

This is one form of hunting that everyone can agree on.