Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/03/20/location-app-divides-world-into-3m²-squares-and-gives-them-all-names.html
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I played a “physical” game recently that involved standing in a square and brandishing something that is one of the three words for that square.
Obviously, the accuracy of GPS on a phone means that it is only ever an approximation, but it was delightful fun. Plus it’s a really good way to introduce people to w3w which is amazing.
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This is not my joke - plagiarised from a friend - but was too good not to share:
Ah - little Bobby Tables…
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Why? Many years ago I was at an event on the Nat’l Mall and sent my location via text. It just made a dot on the recipient’s Google Maps. As long as I stayed there, they could find me. Plus, there’s also location sharing now, which means even if I were wandering about, they could catch up to me. Am I missing some part of this story that makes this a new thing?
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There’s also been some criticism on a couple of fronts:
- It’s a closed system - you can only resolve addresses through their server.
- Some of the words are very similar, leading to some easily confused locations that are close enough together for it not be obvious which is correct. » Why What3Words is not suitable for safety critical applications
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My use case for this app was finding friends and family at National Trust sites. You’d get out in the grounds of these sprawling estates where the paths aren’t always obvious, and it would be hard to figure out where everyone was. Or, more often:
“We’re at the toilet with the kids.”
“The one by the café?”
“No, I think it’s closer to the formal garden…”
“Just send me the W3W.”
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Counterpoint: People are using this clever proprietary, patented, closed, commercial system too much. It requires bulk users (e.g. the emergency services) to buy licences and pay service charges, while appearing ‘free’ to end users.
But there is no legal way to work out which location is meant by those three words without going through the official whatthreewords API.
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Your title should be “…divides world into 3m squares…” (drop the 2 superscript).
Unless the squares are 1.73 meters by 1.73 meters (3m^2).
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I assumed this was one of the terrible ads at first. Seeing the comments open was a shock.
What3Words is terrible for many reasons and the poster should, as always, be ashamed of themselves.
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The location slicer scheme that sorts out altitude is gonna be great for navigating places like Shinjuku Station.
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Just reinventing and monetizing the wheel. The difference is in the mnemonics.
Maidenhead Locator System its dimensions are 15” of latitude by 30” of longitude using the 4 pair extension.
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Open Location Code - Wikipedia are more open but less well known, although they do work in google maps (as google invented the scheme)
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I’m sure it’s coincidental and that words are probably assigned completely randomly, but I noticed that many of the locations in Disneyland have a pretty Disney-esque sound to them. For example “Duck Earful Visit” and “Magic Goodness Mulled” were the first two locations that I looked up there.
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Well the app has been around for years, so it’s not new. It’s real benefits come with emergency services. Your never going to be able to text the ambulance 911 operator, but just read out those three words and your done.
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Re the Maidenhead location system. All very nice and handy for a Morse code message, but you try reading our an obscure, meaningless string of letters and numbers when in a stressful emergency situation. Very easy to get it wrong. Just three words is much easier. Plus many 999/911 operators already use JTW.
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That’s fascinating and sounds quite useful. I once called in a car accident and the 911 operator wanted an address. The best I could do was the name of the street and “across from the safeway.”
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I used it to find my niece at a Fridays for Future demonstration, and another time to find the friends I was meeting for a concert in Central Park. There are limited use cases, and convincing others to download it can be a pain, but when you need it W3W really does the job.
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Or just change the 3 to a 9. Each square is 9 square meters.
This platform has been around for years. Did I miss something that there should be two posts about it in a couple of hours?
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I think they’re having a little fun with the database:
No way is that accidental.
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