Planet 9
O uso de instrumentos de localização tem crescido com a convergência das tecnologias móveis. Localização por celular, wi-fi ou GPS está sendo proposta em laptops, palms e telefones celulares. Os GPS receivers são instrumentos de navegação individual, sem possibilidade de interação social ou produção de informação. Empresa de São Francisco propõe o primeiro sistema social de localização, RayGun: um GPS mais divertido com potencialidades sociais e colaborativas. Vejam terchos do post da VentureBeat:
“Can someone build a GPS system that’s not a boring necessity and instead is a fun way to socialize with your friends? That’s what Planet 9 Studios, a San Francisco startup, wants to accomplish with RayGun, a GPS navigation and social networking application. It is already available in 2D and is about to launch a 3D version.
With RayGun, you can create an avatar to represent yourself, and move around in the application. You can also share routes, text chat, share photos and video, and even talk to each your friends over VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol).
By combining these social networking features with GPS, the company calls RayGun the first social navigation application. The application runs on cell phones, personal navigation devices, in-car navigation systems, and PCs. There’s also a 2D version that runs on Google Earth and on Google Maps. RayGun runs in 3D on Windows Mobile, Symbian and Linux based phones. Support for more platforms is coming, says Planet 9 chief executive David J. Colleen.
(…) The big question for Raygun is whether social networking features are a useful addition to a navigation system. When you’re using GPS, you’re often in a rush, so I’m not sure how often you’ll have time to send extra messages. And if you want to socialize with your cell phone, you can already do it with companies like Loopt, a social mapping service where users can share locations with their friends.(…)”