Optus has found that more than twice as many young people in regional areas feel isolated compared to those in the city, while four out of five want more information about events and activities in their local community.

Optus announced the findings as part of its Information to You (i2u) launch today. The innovative program is designed to support regional Victoria by providing councils with EmailSMS messages for youth based communication across the State.

Optus conducted an online survey of 954 young people aged between 14-18 years of age. Their responses guided the development of i2u to ensure the initiative considered the needs and concerns of young people.

Optus General Manager Sales Victoria, Jerry Coll, said the three year program would see Wellington Shire Council be the first of up to five councils to benefit from i2u.

"In our survey, over one third of young people told us that it's difficult to find out about local events and activities. Through i2u, councils will be able to better communicate with some of their hardest to reach residents - young people," Mr Coll said.

"As part of i2u it is anticipated that each region will receive 24,000 Optus EmailSMS messages each year. Optus will supply the technology at no cost, while each council's youth development team will manage the content.

"The uses are many - from publicising upcoming youth gigs to sending health promotion messages or links to new community websites," Mr Coll said.

Mr Coll said Optus was committed to supporting communities in which it operated as well as providing communications solutions - and i2u reflects both of these commitments.

Optus i2u research shows that young people in regional areas indicated some interest or a strong interest in more information on:

• places to hang out with friends - 98%
• events that parents would feel comfortable for them to attend - 90%
• FReeZa events - 80%
• sport - 77%
• theatre and drama - 64%

Wellington Shire Council Mayor, Cr Beth Ripper, said i2u would assist the council in reaching younger residents.

"One of the challenges facing councils like Wellington is communicating to all residents - particularly as so many of our residents live away from the larger centres. We are a large shire with lots of small communities.

"i2u is a tool we can use to keep in touch with any young person with a mobile, allowing us to send messages from our computers to the mobiles of thousands of young people.

"I encourage all young people to register for this free service and keep connected to what is going on in the Shire," Cr Ripper said.

Optus' i2u research also showed:

• 95% of respondents have a mobile phone
• SMS is the second most popular way for young people to find out information, after MSN
• Over three quarters of respondents identified social issues such as binge drinking, dangerous driving, bullying and illegal drugs as problems in their local area

Other i2u initiatives will soon be launched in the North East, Grampians, Loddon Mallee, and Barwon regions.

Visit http://optusbusiness.com.au/sms to register for i2u.

Media contact:
Rora Furman
Phone: 9654 4799
Mobile: 0402 893 868

Note to editors: These text messages will only be sent once a young person has opted in and registered to receive them. Equally young people can opt out of the service and stop receiving these messages at any time.

Survey Information
Data were obtained using a sample of 954 interviews with young people aged between 14 and 18 across Victoria from 27 February to 4 March 2007. Interviews were conducted online using a specially managed panel recruited for research purposes only. Quotas were applied by gender, age and location and data were weighted to reflect the population distribution.

An indicative margin of error at the 95% confidence interval is +3.2%. This means that if the 'true' value in the population is 50% then 19 out of 20 surveys will return a result between 46.8% and 53.2%.