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New GPS Navigator Relies On 'Wisdom of the Crowds'
Hugh Pickens writes "The New York Times is running an article on Dash Express, a new navigation system for automobiles that not only receives GPS location data, but broadcasts information about its travels. Information is passed back to Dash over a cellular data network, where it is shared with other users to let them know if there are slowdowns or traffic jams on the road ahead. The real benefit of the system isn't apparent until enough units are collecting data in a given area - so Dash distributed over 2,000 prototype units to test drivers in 25 large cities."
> How long... before users get a button to press when they see a speed trap?
> If enough users report a speed trap at a given intersection or off-ramp,
> the system could issue an alert to other drivers approaching the area.
> People would love that.
It'll happen in about minus 10 years, if my experiences in Australia in the late 1990s are anything to go by.
Agreed. And this isn't something new. The two major road data providers, TomTom and Tele Atlas, already have their "crowdsourcing" tools to improve the maps of their GPS Nav systems (and any other other of their customers, such as Google, Microsoft and Yahoo!). See MapShare and MapInsight, their official tools. Of course, OpenStreetMap is could be considered another pertinent project bridging GPS and crowdsourcing. Oh, and by the way, you have real-time traffic in Google Earth too you know. And we discussed p2p networks for road traffic some time ago.
/. to discuss the last Microsoft Virtual Earth release this week. It's really major. My story submission about it was rejected. There's even a Google SketchUp competitor in there and many features we won't see anytime soon on Google Maps / Google Earth (and other few worthy competitors).
And now, totally off-topic, I would have liked
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