These days, it seems like everyone has a cell phone.  In fact, of the approximately 303 million people in the United States, there are an estimated 272,400,386  wireless subscribers.  This means the cell phone is more  ubiquitous than the PC.  Because of this ubiquity, and the increasing number of people carrying "smartphones", software developers are rushing to design  applications that harness the power of location-aware technologies built into the device itself, such as embedded Global Positioning System (GPS) chips, cameras, and mapping software.  Taken as a whole, these technologies are often marketed as Location Based Services, or LBS for short, and provide very powerful and useful tools for navigating our environments.  An interesting article in the NY Times examines a variety of ways we, and the companies that develop these applications,  think about and use these new technologies:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/science/17map.html?ref=science

The article poses the question: How will we make these locating and mapping programs fit our everyday needs and lifestyles?  It documents several successful new applications that utilize the physical screen of a wireless device to visually relay information about the surrounding environment.  An example is Google's "Latitude" program, which pinpoints your exact location then finds your friends in that vicinity.  Users of this program find it great to useful for meeting up with people after work, or for parents to keep tabs on children.

But how can mapping and location programs be utilized by people with disabilities?  I could certainly see the utility in developing an application that shows the exact location of an accessible taxi cab. Many taxis are now vans or SUVs, which I cannot get into because of being in a wheelchair.  An application like that would allow me to know exactly what intersection to wait at to hail an accessible cab. 

Or, what happens if you can't see a screen at all?  How do we develop maps of our environment that allow the blind and visually impaired to "see"?  One example is Dr. Bruce Walker's "Accessible Aquarium".  This GA Tech research project uses a video camera to track all the fish in an aquarium.   A computer program then designates a specific sound or rhythm to each fish, or each species of fish.  The pitch, rhythms and sound volumes of the fish all vary depending on where they are located in the tank at a given time.    One could envision a veritable symphony if the program were tracking dozens of fish in an area.

According to the article, every company wants in on a piece of the mobile mapping and locating pie.  So the question begs: How do you use maps throughout your day?  And how could that map be developed into a cell phone application that you'd use everyday?  Let's hear your thoughts!

-Ben