David Janes' Code Weblog

Alec Saunders has a seriously cool article on his blog about how your iPhone knows where it is. I got to experience how well this works yesterday when we used TimmyMe in the McCowan Road/Ellesmere Avenue neighborhood to grab a coffee pre-meeting:

Many folks assume that iPhone’s location services are GPS based. In fact, they’re not. [...]

Skyhook’s innovation is to augment that with WiFi hotspot locations. Why WiFi? It can be wonderfully accurate, to within 30 to 60 feet, or 10 to 20m which is roughly the same as GPS. WiFi can establish a fix within less than a second. And, WiFi is not vulnerable to overhead obstructions, so it can be used indoors.

Skyhook’s technology relies on a database of WiFi access points in over 2,000 cities (and growing). Much like Google, they use vehicles to drive cities, and using a laptop in the vehicle, they chart the location of WiFi access points. In addition, on iPhone as users use the mapping application, new locations and newly discovered WiFi access points are automatically added to the database. It’s a kind of automated crowdsourcing, based on usage.

My emphasis on that last sentence. Very cool.

OK, it’s time to officially unveil my new company: Discover Anywhere Mobile. We’re creating mobile guides for the tourism and hospitality sector, and similar products for advanced store locators, conference guides, etc.. Platform-wise, we’re creating iPhone & BlackBerry applications, and then a mobile web browser version to catch other devices. Our belief is that over the next three years this is going to be the way tourists and travelers consume information – they want everything in the palm of their hands. Why would you want to carry a tour guide book with you anymore?

Note, and this is important, that we are not a content company. Our target clients are Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs), festival & event organizers, large corporations, and so forth. We will write apps on their behalf using their data and the app will be released under their names. Discover Anywhere Mobile will handle all the bolts and nuts of making this happen: importing & managing data, creating & customizing apps, updating user’s apps, look & feel, etc.. DMOs provide the marketing and data, we provide the infrastucture and services to make it all happen.

Here’s the start of our official blurb:

Discovery Anywhere Mobile creates customizable mobile travel guide applications for Destination Management Organizations. Discover Anywhere Mobile can quickly and cost effectively compile your DMO’s event and listing information into mobile applications for the iPhone, BlackBerry and mobile web browsers. Applications created with Discover Anywhere Mobile’s services will meet traveler’s need for concise, relevant, timely destination information at the exact time and place they need it most – at your destination.

Go to our website and read more, and if you have your own site, please provide a link!

Sorry for the lack of posting – I’m busy applying my ideas rather than coming up with new ones