Wozniak Unveils WozNet

dki writes "Steve Wozniak's WozNet is covered in an article at the New York Times today. His company Wheels of Zeus, mentioned previously on Slashdot last year, plans to create wireless networks that use GPS to track clusters of electronic tags within a 1- or 2-mile radius of a base station. The tags "will be able to generate alerts, notifying the owner by phone or e-mail message when a child arrives at school, a dog leaves the yard or a car leaves the parking lot.""

Comments

where did I leave my keys?

[dirvish]

The tags will only cost about $25 and I am sure that price will go down w/ time. I would really like a nice small tag for my car keys...

Not a bad thing

[Raindance]

So, I was a little distressed that Woz, the archetype of the computer good guy, invented a way to track things- shadows of the 'digital angel' system, et cetera.

But this is local tracking, not global tracking, and that makes all the difference. It doesn't lend itself to big databases, cross-correlation, et cetera, and all the big evil things which are made possible with global tracking; it just helps you keep track of your own stuff.

Very cool Woz.

Re:Not a bad thing

[superdan2k]

...It doesn't lend itself to big databases, cross-correlation, et cetera, and all the big evil things which are made possible with global tracking...

Sure it does...if you missed it, some of the coverage mentioned that multiple base stations can be linked together to provide a "neighborhood watch" function, which is pretty cool. From the sound of it, there's not much to stop you from linking up base stations on a nationwide network...the trick there, of course, is knowing which items you're looking for. Something like this would be great for tracking stolen bicycles, for example. A WozNet tag in the down tube makes it impossible to fuck with, short of cutting apart the frame, thereby ruining it.

You could do some other really cool shit, like keeping track of where bike racers are on a course at any given moment -- which would make more sense to Joe Average than telling him that Lance Armstrong (Vive Le Lance!) has a 35 second lead over Jan Ullrich.

Everyone gets all worried about Big Brother, of course, but Jesus Christ, do you think that the U.S. Government really gives a fuck about where your Trek Madone 5.9 or your limited edition X-Men #500 with the supermegaholographic RealPlatinum(TM) has run off to? Of course not.

If you want your Libertarian minimal-government-involvment society (as many Slashdot posters/readers seem to), you need to have a system in place to police yourself and your belongings. WozNet is one of those.

Re:double standards at slashdot

[mark_lybarger]

i'm not so sure there's a grey line there unless this is of a state where 17 is considered legal age. parents are responsible for their kids up till the age they leave the house. they're responsible to feed them and responsible for when they run a car into someone's mailbox. i believe they have an intrinsic right and responsibility to monitor their kids whereabouts, even if they need to use such discrete methods as this.

Re:yay, tracking!

[feed_me_cereal]

I would guess that you don't have kids.

Kids right to privacy from their parents ends where the parents responsibilities to ensure their safety and well being begin.

I would guess you don't know many other parents.

What you mentioned is all fine and good, and perhaps it would be nice to see your kids make it to school all safe and sound from your pc, but don't make the mistake that all parents are as altruistic as you may be. I imagine a great deal of parents will use these as house-arrest devices, tracking every movement of thier kids all the way through 18 years of age. I've met plenty of people who would, so don't tell me that's bullshit. Remember, "Parents responsibilities to ensure safety" are defined by the parents, and there are plenty of morons/assholes out there who will use these devices to some pretty sick ends. I've met some strange people who grew up under very repressive households; I could only imagine how much grief these devices would have added.

Re:Can you say CIRCUMVENTION?

[stienman]

A device I saw which claims to do the same thing (could be the same) was a watch that is locked onto the persons arm - it can be unlocked manually or remotely, but requires a key of some sort or an unlock command for central.

Just wrap tinfoil around it, or better yet, slam it against every wall you walk past. Eventually it'll get too expensive to replace, and the old fashioned methods of checking up on your own kids yourself and becoming involved in their lives will again become common.

-Adam

How about firefighters?

[anthony_dipierro]

I wonder if this could be included on firefighter equipment to track firefighters inside a burning building. How expensive are the receivers? Surely $25/tag isn't too much for a department to spend. But maybe the receiver would cost too much. How well do they work indoors? I'd imagine the GPS part is useless indoors.

Re:tracking everything

[Kombat]

What if a paedophile managed to hack into the system, and then had instant access to the exact locations of thousands of children ?

You mean like cracking open a phone book and looking under "Schools?" Or did you mean picking up a local tourism brochure and flipping to the "Playgrounds" section? Perhaps even something as evil and insidious as looking up daycare centers on the Internet using YellowPages.com?

Maybe he can find one on their own, somewhere quiet.

Near enough that he/she won't be gone by the time the pervert arrives? "Hey, there's one by itself (boy or girl?) in the trees near Seattle. If I catch the 7:00 commuter flight out of San Diego and make the connection in Chicago, I can be there by ... " Sure.

Given the level of fear over people using their credit card numbers on computers connected to the internet,

Bad example. Those "fears" are nothing more than irrational, uneducated, paranoid FUD. The Internet is a far safer place to exercise your credit card than virtually all physical retail outlets.