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Using Cellular Traffic to Monitor Traffic Jams
An Anonymous Coward writes "The BBC has this story about Scots company Applied Generics and their plan to use cellphone location data to determine where there are traffic jams and (presumably) generate (and sell?) evasive routing tactics for drivers. They are using both passive cellular traffic (what you get when the phone is switched on) and active (drivers phoning up to say they'll be late - in standing traffic, I hope) to look for clusters of immobile cellphones along major routes. The whole idea has a sort of "why didn't I think of that?" neatness. Personally I wouldn't mind my own traffic being used wholesale (aggregated with thousands of other users), but how do other /.ers feel about a company profiting from data emitted by the cellphone that they paid for?"
there seems to be a BIGASS traffic jam inside that skyscraper over there! I think this is a dumb idea. it's not like people turn off thier phones when no on the road. And there is going to be a higher concetration of cell phones turned on inside of office buildings than on the street. And the buildings can be retty damn close to the street too. it could look like there is a major jam at a street corner for example, when in reality, it really is just an office building that has alot of mobile phone using tenants.