24 Sep 09 Waze social mobile app for crowd-sourced traffic and mapping just released for all major mobile devices

Reader's Comments

1. Barry Wheeler | 08 Oct 2009 11:42 am

   Can’t see this being useful in provinces where the use of any handheld device while driving is illegal.

   How will this be addressed?

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   • Robin | 12 Oct 2009 9:13 pm

     Agreed.

     The issue about interacting with all the new mobile systems (many of which are designed to be used or deployed in cars) is one that most public policy people are still grappling with.

     Waze has many disclaimers, both in the legal TOS on their site as well as on the device itself, that mention the dangers of being distracted by using the app.

     It’s not just about interacting with mobile devices. These types of bidirectional entertainment and information systems are now being built in directly into the dashboards of vehicles.

     The big challenge (for vehicle manufacturers as well as governments) will be on finding ways to leverage the benefits of the tools without having the car (or, umm, motorcycle!) become a central point for doing everything but the fundamentals of driving.

     When I first took the course (driving) back in the mid-eighties, our instructor mentioned how 95% of driving was about vision.

     Today, we have vehicles equipped with a plethora of distractions that are becoming more and more distracting.

     Personally, I’ve conditioned myself to not use the interfaces (whether it’s radio, GPS, navigation, knowledge sharing or whatever) in the vehicle in a way that undermines that 95% rule; eyes on the road, mind on the road.

     The Waze software is pretty smart, with a great touch interface, and is programmed to not accepted text input (for entering details about one-touch info such as traffic, etc) when it detects (via GPS) that the vehicle is in motion. That said, like any nav device, it can be distracting.

     The real winner in this tech is the crowdsourcing of basic traffic data (uploading GPS points, speed, etc) in addition to the manually shared info (such as traffic, hazards, speed cams, police, what have you)…

     The deal breaker (for now) is that Canada has zero maps built on the Waze system, and it means having it built from scratch using uploaded GPS data and subsequently editing it from a desktop using their map updating feature.

     Ouch. It’s a big challenge having a crowdsourced mapping environment.

     I thought SimCity was tough.

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