Blog | News & Information on Wireless Services & Telecommunications
Posted: 01/20/10 by Mobile Future Team
Out of the devastation in Haiti have come extraordinary stories of survival. One amazing first-person account is of Dan Woolley, a Denver-native, who found himself trapped beneath the rubble of his hotel in Port-au-Prince. The tool that saved his life? His iPhone. Through his wireless connection he was able assess his injuries and diagnosis a broken leg.
Woolley used the light from his iPhone to show him his injuries and diagnosed it properly as a broken foot. Then, he used the instructions from the app to treat the excessive bleeding from cuts on his legs and the back of his head.
Furthermore, he was able to figure out his location within the building using GPS and find an elevator shaft—which lead him to safety. A true testament of personal ingenuity in the face of catastrophe.
Posted: 01/05/10
Ever see a pothole or a tree that's fallen in the road and think, "Someone ought to fix that"?
Well, if you're in Washington, DC, you're in luck. All you need to do is snap a photo with your PDA and using the city's DC 311 mobile app, pair it with a GPS location. You then upload it into a local government database. This also works for graffiti, broken parking meters and any other public nuisance.
Other cities from New York to San Francisco have also moved to harness the power of mobile consumers. The practical result, as CNN reports is that:
[T]ech geeks transform banal local government spreadsheets about train schedules, complaint systems, potholes, street lamp repairs and city garbage into useful applications for mobile phones and the Web. The aim is to let citizens report problems to their governments more easily and accurately; and to put public information, which otherwise may be buried in file cabinets and Excel files, at the fingertips of taxpayers.
San Francisco and other cities are trying to develop a national standard for municipal government data. That way, a mobile app that tracks, say, bus service in San Francisco could also be used in any other city. That could enable cities that cannot afford to develop their own mobile apps to benefit.
Posted: 11/05/09 by Mobile Future Team
Ever wondered what the place where you are standing looked like 200 years ago? Ever wonder what a far away object looks like up-close?
In just a couple of years our smartphones may be able to answer these questions for us. Technologists are developing "augmented reality" applications that can take visual information from the web and infer what our surroundings looked like in the past or give us more detailed views of distant objects.
Experts say smartphones of the near future may physically resemble the smartphones of today, but their capabilities will better resemble our computers. Designers and technologists predict that many phones will have foldable screens similar to e-readers of today. Researchers are even experimenting with virtual keyboards, which will allow users to type over an imaginary keyboard while sensors pick up the keystrokes.
A recent article in the New York Times details the exciting developments in smartphone technology.
Today's smartphones can do almost anything a PC could do in 2007, but in a couple of years smartphones may have enough computing power to enable much more sophisticated applications that truly take advantage of the device's portability.
This is good news for smartphone users. If you love your phone, but prefer your laptop keyboard and all its capabilities, it may not be too long before you've got the best of both worlds in one portable device.
Posted: 10/16/09 by Mobile Future Team
"Augmented reality" apps that meld the virtual and actual world are popping up for everything from dining choices to sightseeing narratives. These applications marry a phone's GPS and compass features with access to high-speed wireless networks to provide users with local Web content.
The first phones with Google's Android operating system, which enables augmented reality, have come out in the past year. The iPhone debuted a compass app in June, and Apple recently joined Google in making it possible for software developers to overlay images on the phone's camera view. And other companies are following suit.
Amsterdam-based Layar recently released an augmented reality browser for Android phones. Layar lets you search for things on Google, but delivers the results based on your location as determined by the GPS readout. Users also can sign up to have certain types of information automatically appear on phone screens. The company is working on a 3-D function that it hopes to release in November.
Another "augmented reality" leader is Yelp, a Web site with business reviews written by customers. After the iPhone got a compass, Yelp created Monocle, an app allowing information to overlay onto a real-time view of the world. Built by a Yelp intern, Monocle combines the iPhone's camera view with tiny tags indicating the names, distances and user ratings of proximate businesses.
And then there is Robotvision, a 99-cent program built by Portland, Ore.-based developer Tim Sears. Hold your phone parallel to the ground and Robotvision displays a map of your surroundings. Hold the phone up, and Robotvision hits augmented-reality, highlighting places like coffee shops and bars.
Sure, there are some issues hindering augmented reality apps. There are technological limitations - cell phones need to be more powerful, cameras and graphics improved, and GPS more precise. But, as cell phones get even smarter and GPS and wireless networks improve, consumers may be spending more time in a virtually enhanced world.
Posted: 11/06/08 by Molly Kocour
This is probably a better story for Valentine's Day, but Alana Semuels at The Los Angeles has a gr8 article about txting 4 D8s. Whether you want a BFF or a <3throb, mobile services are there to help:
"Tech-savvy singles are now relying on cellphone-based services to find new dates and friends. The programs help users find strangers to exchange text messages with and even find, on a handset's digital map, nearby people looking to connect."
For those concerned that this reads like the opening scene of a Freddy Krueger remake, the reality is that dating services can keep strangers from seeing your phone number or location, though they'll have a sense of your proximity.
ADBB Poof!
Posted: 08/01/08 by Allison Remsen
As I approach the end of my second week as the new executive director for Mobile Future, I just want to take a minute to introduce myself. I've followed the communications industry for many years working for the House Democratic leadership on Capitol Hill and the telecom and cable associations.
With so much of how we communicate changing, this is a pretty amazing time to work in this sector. From my previous gigs though, it always looked like the wireless folks were having way too much fun. Their devices could take pictures, play music, show movies -- and they could do it anywhere.
When I told people I was coming to Mobile Future, I was amazed at how quickly my friends would whip out their wireless devices to not just tell me, but show me how much they loved them. I recently spent one afternoon with a friend who waited nine hours in line to get his new iPhone and he couldn't stop talking about how great it was.
Another friend loves his wireless phone so much he insisted I use it as a GPS for a drive we had made plenty of times.
Surprisingly, my past jobs never got quite the same reaction...
Posted: 07/21/08 by Molly Kocour
If you're like me, and your sense of direction doesn't always lead you in the right direction, you'll be interested to hear about the innovative ways that GPS is entering the cellular world.
Nokia has just announced its acquisition of Navteq, a leading digital map provider in the United States. Navteq, which provides maps, can already be found in most in-car and portable GPS systems and, with this deal, they will find their way into the hands of about a billion cell phone users.
Instead of relying on government maps, Navteq hires its own teams to drive around recording and collecting data - making their maps very accurate and reliable. But, imagine how much more accurate and reliable they will become when a billion cell phone users are contributing to the process!
Navteq CEO, Green, said, "a cell phone could also be a live probe, noting that real-time data about how quickly a handset is moving could provide clues as to the speed of traffic in an area."
The future of GPS and location-based content is really taking off. The research firm, Gartner, predicts that global subscribers to this kind of service will reach, "43.2 million in 2008 and hit almost 300 million in 2011." Soon, you could be walking around in a foreign city and your phone, which knows where you are, will deliver restaurant recommendations and points of interest.
By downloading a cell phone application called, Bones in Motion, athletes are already using such GPS technology to aid in their training. For example, runners can use this application to not only track distance run, speed, and calories burned, but also such information as weather conditions and difficulty. All this can then be uploaded and stored as a running log.
If this isn't enough, GPS and location-based technology has even made it to the canine world. A few companies are in the early stages of developing a tracking system which monitors the location of your dog, sending you a warning text message if your dog leaves a designated zone.
Then there's my favorite one. A program called, Superhero, by Yougetitback.com, tracks lost or misplaced cell phones. You can even program your phone to ring, "I've been stolen," or "Take me home," if it goes missing!
Maybe your sense of direction is better than mine, but there are clearly multiple benefits to having a GPS-enabled cell phone.
Posted: 05/09/08 by Chris Parandian
This morning I had the privilege of talking with a senior journalism studentat the University of Maryland who is conducting a report on thewireless industry. As a part of that report, she was looking into the efforts of the industry to provide services that can deliver in a timeof need.
With that in mind, I wanted to highlight the story of Elizabeth Shoaf who was held captive in an underground bunker in South Carolina. Ms. Shoaf was able to convince her kidnapper to allow her to play gameswith his cellphone and also took the opportunity to text message her mother when he fell asleep. This led authorities to her location using triangulation and she was rescued.
An Amber Alert was not issued in the Shoaf case but they are another valuable tool in raising awareness of a missing child. The wireless industry worked withthe Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to make this happen. Any wireless subscriber can opt in to receive alerts (you will not be charged for the message alert) and you can sign up here.
Safety is your most important call and amber alerts are another way to participate in your community. Signing up takes little effort and you could make a huge difference in saving a life.
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Tags: eHealth, GPS, Mobile Applications, Mobile Health, Public Safety, Investment/Competition