map and gps mashups in InfoWeek

The March 17, 2007 InformationWeek has a fairly extensive article with sidebars, Maps Meet Mashups.

among the hottest and most useful new generation of applications on the Web--the location mashup.

More than 35,000 location mashups--ranging from restaurant locators to celebrity trackers--have been created using Google Maps alone.

I was interested by their sidebar GPS Mashups Are Going Nowhere.

Wireless carriers generally don't share the information generated by a phone's GPS chip--a user's longitude and latitude, in particular--or other network data that might be used to pinpoint a phone's location. Just getting GPS data can be difficult if not impossible for would-be mashup makers.

Well, yes but.  While most phones don't have accessible GPS, newer phones with Bluetooth and good Java support can talk to an external GPS.  However, it's certainly true that the cell providers are killing this in multiple ways:

• limiting access to internal phone location information
• limiting ability to run third-party apps on the phone
• outrageously expensive Internet data charges
• trying to lock users into the provider's special (and extra cost, always extra cost) GPS mapping offering

I found lots of GPS mapping applications I'd like to try on my Sony K790 using a Bluetooth external GPS:

del.icio.us/scilibfurl/mapping+cellphone

but let's check last month's Internet data bill (most of it before I turned on the very slightly better data plan)

Yes, that's right, 4 MEGAbytes for over $200.  That's megabytes folks, you know, the little things that fit 1000 at a time onto the 1 gig memory sticks scattered in your desk drawers.  Four 3.5" floppy disks worth of data for $200.  Back to the Future!  Except if floppies had cost $25 each.

But not to worry, Rogers has Telenav Navigator!  Except not for my phone.  Oh, and it will cost $10 a month.  If I'm reading it right, that's $10 a month PLUS the data charges.  Because you know, 5 cents or 3 cents per kilobyte wouldn't be enough, they had to tack an extra ten bucks on.

So while I may try some mapping apps, they're going to be ones that use locally pre-loaded maps (e.g. on the phone's memory stick) and that never, ever connect to the Internet.