Slashdot Mirror
Describe Any Location On Earth In 3 Words
First time accepted submitter jameshumphreys writes "London startup what3words has successfully launched a new website which has carved the world map into almost 57 trillion 3m x 3m squares, assigning each square a simple, unique 3 word address. For instance, the 'what3words' for the famous Peter Pan statue in London's Hyde Park is 'union.prop.enjoy'. This means you can easily describe even remote locations with great precision. CEO Chris Sheldrick says, 'We see our service being most useful where current methods of describing location (e.g. postcodes or ZIP codes) don't do the job well enough or don't do the job at all — but of course it has applications as a preferred alternative even where the existing solutions do a decent job, but perhaps less precise/customised than w3w.' An API is planned 'in the coming weeks.'" The heart of Disneyworld could be "Radioactive Humanoid Mice"; what would you call your neck of the woods?
Hot Frickin' Desert
@Valentinial
Without being able to look up the mapping from the database, the three words don't seem to be useful.
Perhaps it be paired with Longitude and Latitude; making a really useful yet *boring* system all of a sudden more *fun*, yet still accessible without access to the database.
It's a TinyUrl for map coordinates, but more human memorable?
embrace.extend.extinguish anyone?
Ezekiel 23:20
So, I am confused how this is better than longitude and latitude? I can use L&L offline, and it can have almost an infinite precision. Also, with my memory I am no more likely to remember the 3 words here than a long string of numbers.
why.not.another
cheese.ball.central
i.hate.periods
t.l.a
Because most people can't remember a long string of numbers but they can easily remember three english words. It is the same reason people don't carry around 128-bit AES keys in their head, even though it would make for much better security.
no, "most" would imply more than 3.5 billion people had that ability. most humans would not have such for english, but maybe in their native tongue.
our computers and cell phones remember such things as GPS very well, let's stick with that.
Sometimes, plain coordinates or a normal address would be better. Our house is on just over a hectare of land. That's about 1000 of those damn word triplets; even a fast talker would go blue in the face saying them. Our cottage is on 6½ hectares - a whole chorus would be left breathless.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
I'll describe the entire Earth in only 2:
Mostly Harmless
Fully licensed blockchain psychiatrist
monetizing is simple. they expect dolts to pay them a yearly cost for upkeeping a special address for you.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
See also: Category:Geographic coordinate systems.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
It does seem rather stupid and useless. It seems to me just a way to crowd source descriptions of a large number of locations, once that is done to a high level of density, you can monetize the data in some way I would guess. But again, useless and stupid for any real use.
Yes, but unfortunately we don't have a super great interoperable way to exchange those GPS coordinates right now. We do have lots of ways to exchange words. This bridges that gap.
Horse, battery, staple.
Pretty much, yeah... an interesting idea, but more or less useless, in my opinion. The only advantage words have over numbers is that words can be easier to remember. Unfortunately, these words are only accessible online. If you have web access, then more or less by definition you have a device that you can takes notes on. Accordingly, you can record exact coordinates with essentially the same amount of effort it'd take to record random words.
Have you not realized that three english words are easier to remember than 12-20 random numbers?
...unless you're not an English speaker.
Which is significant, if this is being used to identify locations on a *global* scale.
Remembering three English words is only useful if there was some descriptive value to the words tying them uniquely to that place. So you tell me to meet you at foo.bar.baz. Where the hell is that? How do I get there from plugh.plover.frobozz?
Slashdot
nobody.reads.TFA
See, but the thing is, it provides no unique utility. Semantic, searchable map: already done better by Google maps. Highly specific location identifier: already done better by geocoordinates. Human memorable name for location, already done better with street names and city. There's no unique role to fill here.
How about bloviating.moron.central?
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
This is going to catch on. Stupid ideas always do.
probably.your.neighborhood
Springfield, USA
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
insert.meme.here
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
DC is the Asshole of America - Hence the foul odor, hot air, and irritating sounds that originate from within. ... Which is quite an amazing feat, considering that it's situated squarely between the nation's armpit (NJ) and limp dick (FL).
Until you realize that the Horn of Plenty (White House or Congress, take your pick) is right in there, reaming away in a frenzy.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
I'm sitting at beach.country.pineapple and my co-worker is at closing.rheumatoid.begin. How does that help someone find out if he's 6 feet away or 6000 miles away?
And how do you spell "rheumatoid" again?
Nonsense, no "shared app" is necessary other than basic email or messaging
N 25 18.340 W 22 28.100
...could provide a few special moments.
Stockholm Central
Route 4, near Rutland VT, USA
In the South Atlantic, about 250 km off the coast of Argentina
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
I don't care where it is, I'm moving to fuck.that.shit
Is 1563649 a prime number?
They want to be bought by a Google for a billion. Hence all the hype building.
Now what does my mom do with that message? If I give her three words and tell her to type them into this website, it will be much more successful that telling her to do the same with a bunch of numbers she will easily fuck up.
57 trillion locations, with three words each, with no duplicate IDs. Hmm, 38,000+ uniquely spelled words required to be able to do this.
Hmmm, not sure whether I know 38,000 uniquely spelled words or not. But I'm willing to bet most people don't.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Darmok.Jalad.Tanagra
That said, I live at:
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.Antidisestablishmentarianism
which also proves that the concept has no merit.
*** Don't be dull.***
stupid.fucking.idea
or more accurately:
google.please.buyus
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Star Trek Into Darkness did it better.
In that movie, a set of four 2-digit transporter coordinates has enough resolution to distinguish a location on a planet in another solar system from a moon of Jupiter.
(Also, using a transporter the size of a duffel bag (including power source), you can transport someone from Earth to Kronos. Never mind that the planet is light years away, Earth and Kronos are spinning on their axis, both planets are going around their respective suns, both systems are traveling through space in different directions, and you're doing this from a seated position in a damaged ship whirling out of control. Also, the transport is instantaneous - it goes at warp speed without a ship!)
(Oh, and let's hide the ship underwater, even though the indigenous population wouldn't be able to see us if we stayed in orbit.)
email her a link to a google map of that precise location, then. Create a list of locations you like - your favorite knitting, candle, and cat supplies stores - and then share that location list with your mom. Everything she needs to access those locations is already on her smartphone, most likely. The vast majority of humans don't speak english well - fark, we can't even get half the people here in the US to do it. Numbers though - those are a certainty. Telling someone to write down a series of numbers works easily, asking them to write down words they may not know is not. Those words only being useful at a specific website, which then does nothing more than give you the location... Yeah, I get it, they're trying to be for latitude/longitude what DNS is for IP space. But silly "flying.monkey.dung" names isn't the way to do that.
So now, instead, you've got to give her the three words, plus the URL of the website, which she will easily fuck up.
3words.....what?
What three words?
Oh...type into my browser....
ok...
www.what.three.words.com
I don't get anything.
Oh..ok.
www.what.3.words.com
It's still not working.
Grrrr.
www.what3.words.com
This stupid thing!
Just give me your damned latitude and longitude!!!
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
Because most people can't remember a long string of numbers but they can easily remember three english words. It is the same reason people don't carry around 128-bit AES keys in their head, even though it would make for much better security.
So you're saying it's easier to try and memorize 3 words for each of the 57 trillion locations?
There isn't any kind of cohesive system for this. There's no way to look at one "address" and then infer neighboring addresses, for example. It simply has nothing which allows for easy reference, without access to this company's service you can't look them up on a map.
Basically what they're selling is a marketing tool. They want businesses to pay them to name a location, so people can search for the name of that location and see it on a map. Which begs the question, why not just search for the name of the business in the first place?
The only problem this seems to solve is the problem of these guys not having enough of your money in their wallets.
probably.your.neighborhood
Springfield, USA
Is that the one at the intersection of Ohio, Nevada, Maine, and Kentucky?
Words are harder to remember than they'd like. Say I tell my friend to meet me at "award.tricks.fish" (an example from their page, somewhere in NYC) but he remembers "award.trick.fish". Suddenly he's buying a plane ticket to Chicago, which is all just the same, because I accidentally travelled to "awards.trick.fish" and ended up just outside London. Plurals, gerunds, past tense and other word forms that have different endings make this a really unwieldy system for conveying precise information verbally. It's easy enough electronically, but then why not just make a google maps short url link and stick it in an SMS? Problem solved...
For instance, the 'what3words' for the famous Peter Pan statue in London's Hyde Park is 'union.prop.enjoy'
What's wrong with "peter.pan.statue.hyde.park.london"?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
It's even more disappointing when you find that there is no here.be.dragons . I'll never find a dragon. ;_;