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Universal Alphanumeric Postal Code Proposed
Meshach writes "An article in the Globe and Mail is discussing a possible change to the way postal codes are assigned over the world. NAC Geographic Products will be using Microsoft's MapPoint to power their Mobile Location-Based Services Network, which could change all postal codes in the world to a simpler, more universal format."
Why new postal codes at all? With cheap GPS, why not just start using longitude and latitude?
Try again, mile is not spelled "metre"
Actually, zip codes are still kinda new. They started when your dad was 20: July 1st, 1963, and not mandatory for 2nd & 3rd class mailers until 4 years later. So, it's been in use for only 40 of the post office's 228 years of existence.
Not to nitpick, but how could someone know something for "many a lifetime"? It's a cool idea, and I'd love to be able to implement it!
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
That is a good point. However, more than 7 digits is unavoidable now. With alphanumerics (10 numerals + 26 roman letters - 4 confusable letters = 32):
32^7=3.4e10, aka 34 billion codes. And there are already 6 billion PEOPLE on the globe, and growing. Never mind locations. It just won't cut it.
10^10= 1e10, aka 10 billion, aka phone w/area code. Also won't cut it.
32^10=1.1e15. Plenty.
The trick is that the digits at the front will be easy to remember because they are more likely to be be repeated amongst the addresses you want to know, since you'll be conducting business locally for the most part.
Also, having more numerals than the regular 10 is unlikely to cause problems. Humans are much better at pattern matching and remembering than with sequences.
---If you can't trust a nerd, who can you trust?
According to the article, each zip code will cover about 1 square km. This is almost useless
in the world's densest cities. 30,000 - 80,000 people/km^2 is quite common - New york's lower east side had 170k/km^2 in 1905; Cairo peak at 109k/km^2, and Hong Kong had almost 2 million people per square kilometer*!!
Hopefully, the system will be divisional based on local population density -- like zip codes are now . But if it is, then it will be neither simple (no GPS/zip translation), or it will be of variable length, and/or it will change over time as areas get denser and need redivision (like phone area codes)
* ok, that was a special case of 50k people living in a 0.03km^2 walled city.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
You're from a .edu address so I'll go easy on you :-)
Firstly, it's not England's choice whether to adopt the Euro, it's Great Britain and Northern Ireland's choice. But hey.
Secondly, if the argument against adoption of the Euro was as simple as you make out then we'd have sorted it out on day one!
Apart from ignoring the fact that Sterling is steadily weakening against the Euro, you make the (very common) mistake of making a value judgement about "strong" currency being good for ecomomies and "weak" currency being bad.
Monetary economics doesn't work like that - "strong" and "weak" are simply labels, like "bull" and "bear" on the stock market. Which is good and which is bad depends on what view you have of the market. If you're a manufacturer, then you want a weak currency so that people buy your goods for export. This is the reason why the CBI is pretty much pro Europe right now, and why many multi-national manufacturing businesses have shut down their UK production in recent years.
But if you're a holiday maker, or a business that relies on imports to do its job, then you want a strong one so that your currency goes further abroad.
But the strength of the pound is simply *one* aspect of a huge number of things that have a bearing on whether Euro entry would be good for the UK or not.
But since this is totally off-topic I won't go into that.
"And the meaning of words; when they cease to function; when will it start worrying you?"
"But, the fact of the matter is that the U.S. Postal Service likes its system just fine and will not change it to someone elses liking. Kinda like the metric system."
Metric is a bad analogy. The USPS has no reason to change to suit somebody else because they are the 500 lb. gorilla that literally moves half the world's letter mail. When you're that big, everybody else conforms to you.
(IIRC, the USPS is already starting to implement ZIP+4 codes for outbound international mail to speed up sorting in-country.)
"Even if the new system is better."
How exactly would it be better? And would it be better enough to overhaul all those OCR and barcode readers the USPS uses to sort the mail already? They already seem pretty efficient when it comes to drawing zone maps, what good could possibly come from changing their names?
So far, the only reason I see to sign on to this is the Ferret Effect. "It's new and shiney!"
"The same is true for the Royal Mail."
Aren't they out of business yet, what with their deregulation efforts?
Actually this is done already in e. g. Europe.
The only difference is usage of country abbreviation (the one used on car stickers) and blank as separator.
It would however completely sufficient if US based websites would recognize the world outside and make 'state' a non-mandatory field and have a 'coutry' field as well.
chess