New Obsession: Google Earth

After reading Alex Roy's "The Driver," I became immensely interested in his cross country trips, and the technology he used to prepare for his drive from New York City to L.A. In the book, Roy talks about his quest to break the accepted NY to LA record of 32 Hours, 7 minutes. After 2 test runs for research and reconnaisance purposes, countless calculations for gas consumption, listing and mapping known speed traps, and developing a protocol and backup for any possible snag, he took off from Manhattan headed for California, went as fast as he could (safely) and avoided cops, traffic, and stops along the way. Along the way, he had a series of toys (GPS, Radar Detectors/Jammers, Police Scanners) to play with. Overall, however, it was the use of technology and the extensive preparation that fascinated me. A pimped out BMW M5 added to the glamour a bit, I'll admit.

Fast forward a couple years... Roy has since mapped out his famous run in a Google Earth .kmz file. People who have GE installed (free here) can run his file and see a map pinpointing where they were at what time, where they stopped for gas and tolls, and how fast they were going at various checkpoints, using data from either of the GPS receivers in the M5. They kept the GPS data to verify that their super secret cross-country dash actually happened in the time they claimed (along with gas receipts, toll receipts, and time-coded video), however, that file and my ensuing fiddling with GE have turned me in to a GPS-obsessed, .kmz-generating nerd. What's more exciting these days, is that it's possible to generate and update these files real-time. Recently, Roy was approached with a business opportunity and turned his experience and passion into a company dealing with real-time GPS tracking. He speaks about the technology, his car, his run, etc. in the Authors @ Google series here...

Pocket-PCs, iPhones, and Blackberries all have the capability to capture GPS coordinates in Google Earth formats, upload them to live servers, and broadcast current locations across the internets in near real-life times. Within seconds, my whereabouts can be uploaded and downloaded, and the pushpin that indicates my location on the Google map, will move to indicate my progress.

While I'm still in the "holy crap, that's awesome" phase, there are countless opportunities to turn this technology into useful and profitable ventures. Already companies can run tours, advertise their services, and build their store (or a 3D model of the building at least) in Google Earth, but with real-time tracking, options become more and more exciting.

The kind of surveillance usually reserved for secret government operations suddenly becomes a reality if you can get your hands on the right cell phone... Scary, but also pretty friggin cool.