These ideas were published on May 29, 2003 thus rendering them un-patentable. If you try to patent them you better be able to prove with a bound, signed and witnessed log book that you invented them before I published them

Safety:

-Send help, send tow truck

- Nextel is already offering AAA like service. According to this study roadside assistance is most desired LBS service.

 

-Personal panic button

- for people who are worried about kidnap or other violent crime. Info is sent to an alarm monitoring company who calls the phone and responds appropriately.

 

Personal:

-Set Geo-location reminders

- Instead of a time based reminder, phone beeps when you are near bank or post office for example. This would need to be tied into Outlook or other appointment program.

 

-Stolen bicycle sting operation

Program the phone to report a "low battery warning" in addition to GPS fixes. Tuck the phone under the seat of the bicycle, or in some other hidden location. Lock the bike up with a cheap lock in a high theft area. Press a button on the handset to set the "home" location. If the bike wanders outside this home area, it will report. Catch a thief, or better yet a bicycle theft ring.

 

-Geo-PostIt notes

- Leave notes in space for yourself or others. Mark new restaurants or stores to check out later; mark a house for sale as a reminder to check asking price. Mark an exit on the highway where there is a good place to stop when on a trip; this could be done from the desktop before a trip. I would like to use the GPSter database of locations

 

-Phone Email client

- Send emails from the phone that automatically include a link to a map of where Email is sent from. This has potential to be viral as we could also include a link to a sales website.

 

-Geo-encode digital photo

- Cameras that clip onto phone will be available soon. When picture is downloaded, location information is tied to photographs.

 

-Weather

- Weather information based on current location can be pulled from National weather service and displayed on phone. People in path of severe weather could be warned based on their current location
(weather idea added 7/8/03)

 

-Traffic information

- If enough people are using the phones to report location and current speed, you have a very accurate picture of traffic flow. Phone app could have ability for a user to mark accidents, speed traps, or construction. This idea has network effect benefits; i.e. the more people who have a phone the more valuable each phone is.

-Friend finder

- Phone gives distance and direction to person you are trying to locate. Recently I waited for a friend outside Camden Yards before an Orioles game and I heard at least a dozen people ask into their cell phone, "Where are you now?" I saw one argument between friends over who had been standing at the right agreed upon meeting place. Another way this would work: my phone would show me anyone in my address book who is also at the game (or within a certain radius) and has their phone set on, "Let friends find me." College kids would use this to find where the party is. This idea has potential to be viral as people start asking, "What is your GPS phone number?" It also has network effect benefits.

Small business:

-Mileage tracker DONE

- Logging business use of a personal car is a pain, instead user marks destinations on a map that are business related, at tax time he has a complete, accurate log of all business mileage. At 0.36 cents a mile and assuming a 35% marginal tax rate the phone only needs to record about 450 miles a month to completely pay for itself. ($0.36 X 35% X 450 = $56.70)

-WiFi Locator

- WiFi hotspots are popping up all over, the trouble is how do you find one without a net connection to begin with. Phone is tied into hotspot database and tells you direction and distance to the nearest one.

-Real Estate tool

- Many (most?) states have real estate tax and last sale information online. With the push of a button a house hunter could get: tax assessment, last transaction price, school district, and even crime stats about the house they are driving past.

Other Micro Markets:

-Geocaching

- Geocachers hide something then publish Latitude and Longitude of cache on a web site. Phone could alert user when they are within a certain radius of a cache. They could retrieve cache info from existing web database with phone or use phone to log a new cache location

-Blogging

- Many people have online diaries (web logs), or blogs. Similar to email client, WhereBlog would allow user to make location stamped blog entries.

-website finder

- GeoURL is a location-to-URL reverse directory. It allows you to find websites by their location. an app on the phone tells user of nearby websites.

-game ideas

some Game ideas
Let me know of any other ideas

back to my Main page