MEGAN MCARDLE: If it’s easy to reach lawmakers, they’ll ignore you.

The problem with political action is that it’s hard. You have to get up early, go to meetings, write your representative, find a stamp for the envelope you don’t have for the letter you want to write your representative.… Shouldn’t technology solve this problem, and make it easier to get the political results we want?

Apparently, someone’s been asking that question. My social media feed has supplied me with word of a new application that aims to make political action as easy as sending a text.

The idea is that you text the word “resist” to a number, and after getting a small amount of information (your name, your ZIP code) it will let you set up a letter to fax to your senator. It’s the sort of thing you can do with any spare moment.

It’s a great idea — at first. It’s so great that I suspect it will soon devalue the fax as political currency.

Allow me to explain. There’s a hierarchy of political actions that you can take to impress your legislators with your commitment to an issue. Sending a letter or calling is high on that hierarchy; social media, email and signing Change.org petitions ranks much lower. The new service effectively acts as a political currency converter, allowing individuals to do something easy (text) while appearing to have done something less easy (fax).

There is a reason that more primitive means of communicating with your legislator tend to make them more interested in what you have to say: Those forms of communication cost more of your time, and therefore indicate a level of commitment that might reflect your intentions to donate and vote (for or against the lawmaker in question).

Showing up in person, of course, shows still more commitment.