On Wednesday, 28 August 2019 19:45:13 UTC+3, wrote:
On Wednesday, August 28, 2019 at 12:21:09 PM UTC-4, JS wrote:
On Wednesday, August 28, 2019 at 7:32:27 AM UTC-7, wrote:
On Wednesday, August 28, 2019 at 8:56:39 AM UTC-4, krasw wrote:
WhatsApp groups used in all our comps, pics of gridlists, tasks etc.. distributed smoothly to everyone (plus SoaringSpot, where you can download the task straight to devices). Printed papers available for luddites, of course, you don't want to mess with them as they just were forced into GPS-age.

I am not a Luddite, have used GPS for 20 years and LORAN before that. I have a smartphone and use IGCdroid and GliderLink. But I have a healthy suspicion of the mega-corp spyware. To repeat one of the comments quoted by Jamie to start this thread: "why not stick to the standards, SMS text messages, email, and a web page (a real web site, please not Facebook). Put downloadable documents (task sheets, weather forecasts, grid sheets, etc) on the web site. If they are suitable stand-alone files (PDF, JPG, PNG) they can be downloaded into the mobile devices for later off-line use."

In an International competition, not everybody will have a "local" phone. In this case SMS / text - particularly with attached media - costs significantly more than using something like WhatsApp.
And I hate Facebook (parent of WhatsApp) too.
Jim

The text messages should be plain SMS without attachments, and only have links to the "media", which should be stored on the event's web page. And contestants should be able to choose email rather than SMS (still only links). And hopefully be able to get within range of WiFi before downloading anything large - at the time/location and using the tools of their choice.

This is exatcly how we did things 20 years ago.