Posts Tagged ‘GPS’
Locate mobile phone with GPS-ready SIM-card
GPS for all mobile phone users? The chip manufacturer Sagem Orga and BlueSky Positioning, a developer of localization systems and services, plan on making this possible in the future.
The two companies are jointly releasing a SIM-card with A-GPS (Assisted Global Positioning System) onto the market, said Sagem Orga in a press release. This card is outfitted with a GPS-receiver and an antenna, making accurate pinpointing easy.
According to the manufacturers, the main purpose of the A-GPS SIM-card, is to accurately locate the position of the phone in an emergency and transmit this to Search and Rescue units. However the use for LSB (Location Based Services) can also expand. As Francois Blanchard, Global Accounting Manager at Sagem Orga, explained in the press release, this product marks the beginning of a new era for the SIM-card, offering it a real new service platform.
The manufacturers have not yet released the date of the SIM-card’s launch and its projected cost.
Ipoki.com – social network with GPS-functionality
About two years ago in La Coruña, Spain, a GPS-based social network was founded. Its name, originally “hipoqih”, was changed later to Ipoki as it was easier to spell and pronounce.
Ipoki allows its members to share their current location in real time with other users. To do so, the actual geolocation of the users is usually fixed per GPS. Further one can view, for instance, where one’s friends are at that moment and follow their tracks on either Google Maps or Google Earth, any where on the globe. As stated by the Ipoki-makers on their portal, this service helps to find people, follow their whereabouts and to remain in contact with them, whether in La Coruña, San Francisco, Stockholm or Cape Town.
This service is achieved with the help of an Ipoki-plugin, a small application installed on a GPS-capable mobile device – cell phone, smart-phone, PDA or PocketPC. However, even without such a device, it is still possible to use this GPS Community – one can manually enter one’s location on the website. Whether or not automatic or updated manually, users have complete control as to whom may access their position data: everyone, friends or no one.
Whoever wishes can also use Ipoki to geo-locate photos for Flickr, using photos taken with GPS-enabled cell phones, and also contribute similarly coded Live Videos via Qik.







