Connect to the internet and big brother will know your location

By Jon Mountjoy (8 posts) on November 2, 2007 at 9:12 am

It turns out that lots of folk are beavering away at databases that allow one to translate your IP/WiFi point to an actual physical location. Bin just blogged about how the MPSDK could help architect programs that calculate location, addressing the problem of what happens when you change access point (from fixed to WiFi or back again for example).

He points to the interesting Place Lab which provides software for device positioning, and via that I also found WiGLE, a "wireless geographic logging engine."

I often use iStumbler to show me all access points near by, and that got me thinking. Instead of just using information from a single access point, can't you use information from multiple access points? For example, when I go to my coffee shop I see three access points, two are public, and using information from all of those I'd surely get a better idea of where I am.

Better yet, imagine coupling this with peer-to-peer, using say bluetooth (I want really close peers). Perhaps my machine already has a physical location (I'm connected on a fixed network in Edinburgh). Now another machine close to mine can inherit my physical location. You'll need some kind of time-tagged system of course (I'm getting on a plane tomorrow), but this opens up interesting possibilities for other applications too (watches, PSPs, anything with a bluetooth to connect to a peer to find out where it is).

As the TabletBlog points out, devices such as the Nokia N810 are location aware - so imagine the possibilities of adding this to your social networking. You can have your Facebook page automatically updated with your location, Dopplr too. As Andy Piper points out, it could put an end to all those tweets about "I'm in Edinburgh now, weather fine but mild, rain expected"...

Categories: Mobility

Comments (2) Comments RSS Feed

By Andy Piper on November 2nd, 2007 at 9:27 am
Thanks for the link :-)

I actually think using Twitter for this is pretty neat. There is also Plazes, which essentially used to do exactly what you are describing here, but has recently become a much more generalised activities tool rather than trying you to location based on network address etc. And Dopplr is also pretty cool, as you mention.

By Jon Mountjoy on November 4th, 2007 at 12:09 pm
Thanks Andy. I'd really like to see all these data surfaced in some way, with appropriate security considerations, and without being tied to a service like Twitter. I don't mind Twitter having access to the information, but I'd really like it to be independent of it, so that I own the data. I see a future where we build these services around ourselves (including our current position) and allow other systems access to them.


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