A CEO is going to meet with a long-time corporate rival. Within hours, the rumors are flying that there are secret negotiations but secrecy was absolute. How did reporters find out so quickly? It turns out that a reporter bribed somebody at major cell carriers to track the cell phones of industry CEOs and using a bit of GPS magic discovered that the two CEO's cell phones were within 10 feet of each other and they were in a conference room in a hotel without any industry events going on.
This is the kind of location detection conundrum and opportunity that is starting to appear with new gadgets. If you can talk to it, and it's smart enough, any bit of electronics can tell you where it is. And if you don't know that's part of the feature list, you can be broadcasting your location even though you don't want to.
Now often being able to broadcast your location is important but the key is having such broadcasts being under control. I don't particularly see any interoperability standards that will allow individuals to control all the technology that might snitch on them. There's a crying need for such a thing.
Posted by TMLutas at March 26, 2004 01:45 PM