"Tagging the whole World?" Sounds like a job for Google

Stuart Corner
Friday, 19 September 2008 10:15

Opinion and Analysis

Researchers at the University of Michigan have come up with an idea to make location information available, via Bluetooth, to passing pedestrians. There initial aim is to aid blind people, but they talk of extending the concept to 'tag the whole world'.

The system, called Talking Points, comprises an information storage unit and bluetooth transmitter, known as a 'tag' that would be located outside a place of interest - which could be a public toilet, post office, pub or anything else you care to name that could be of interest to a blind person but of which they might be unaware as the passed by.

This device would communicate information about the facility to a bluetooth unit carried by the passer-by which would, in the case of a blind person, speak the information.

Businesses, local government or anyone wanting to communicate information about a location could purchase these tags, which, it is claimed, would cost less than $US20. Cities could tag information centre, parks or other buildings, for example.

A website would allow Talking Points beacon owners to program their tags and to update their messages. The researchers suggest that other community members could add their comments about the point of interest, and pedestrians using the system could then choose to get those comments. (The owner might want to censor these!)

James Knox, adaptive technology coordinator for the University's Information Technology Central Services and one of the system's developers, explains the rationale for the technology thus: "Blind people can get from point A to point B. They learn to count steps if they have to, but they miss the journey because they don't always know what they're passing. The idea behind Talking Points is to enhance the journey."

He adds that, "Talking Points can be viewed as a first step in the direction of an audio virtual reality designed for people with blindness and very useful to the sighted community as well." As an example he suggests that the service "could give passers by a peek at the specials or sales inside a business. It could offer on-the-go access to customer reviews."

Jason Stewart, a master's student in the School of Information who is involved in the project, suggests that: "If it caught on, this would be an effective way to tag the whole world."

Indeed it would, and isn't it Google's stated ambition to "organise the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." And Google already has much information on specific locations. For example, on Google Maps you are invited to "find businesses, addresses and places of interest."

So, imagine a Talking Point devices with inbuilt GPS and Internet access via a cellular network. Install it in whatever location you want and it could be largely self configuring, communicating its location back to Google (or of course any other information provider) and downloading information for that location. Then, as well as information on its 'host facility' it could communicate location related advertising to people passing that location.

Note that the research team are "exploring other technologies such as GPS," and, in the words of another researcher, "This project enables a type of augmented reality...It shows how we can take user-generated information from the Internet and lay it over reality to help people make sense of where they are in their environment and what the possibilities are around them."

And  don't forget the possibility of selling to them.