So you know what a technology geek I am. I was surfing yesterday and this story made me stop and think “I’ve got to get me one of these”.

Can you imagine? Your phone as your new travel guide?!

If you think this is one of those futuristic type phones that you’d only see on in some Si-Fi television show, or movie, think again because the T-Mobile G1 is available and makes the iPhone look outdated. This new phone will not only tell you that your looking at the Roman Coliseum, but when you turn around 180 degrees and point the phone in the other direction, it will tell you that your now looking at Columna Trajano. (Trojan’s Colum) No joke, the G1 not only knows where you are, but which way you’re facing.

Here’s the really cool part. Not only did the phone guide you through Roman Coliseum, but if you wanted to learn more about this new Colum you’re looking at, it will give you a rundown of what it’s all about via Wikipedia.

Wikitude is the culmination of five years’ work for its Austrian designer, Philipp Breuss, who calls the system “augmented reality”. It’s built to run on Google’s new Android operating system for mobiles - and the first phone to have that is the just-released T-Mobile G1, which uses GPS and triangulation to know exactly where it is and which way it’s facing.

Oh, and ladies, there’s a very cool “ShopSavvy” feature on this phone as well to ensure you get the absolute best price on the next pair of shoes you buy. And guys, don’t think you’re out of the loop on this either, you can use this site to find the absolute best price on the G1. (I found everything, including accessories on Amazon)

While I would agree that not everyone would want to be this independent when traveling, this technology is certainly just the ticket for an early adopter like myself. Like the days of vinyl records, I can see maps, tour guides, and yes travel agents being a thing of the past when it comes to traveling in the future. Many of the tour companies I work with have independent Tours that this new technology would be perfect for.

Speaking of technology.

I was able to dive into some of the PHP and CSS files here and fixed some errors and glitches. You’ll notice the dark green or blue boxes in the comments section have been changed so you can now read them. With so many files and code to look through it took some time, but I found it and finally got it changed.

Also in the realm of comments, we have our first subscriber who has been banned from the blog. Both the name and the IP address have been locked out. I’m just not going to waist my time with it any longer. You don’t see me anywhere but here these days, and people who tune in here are looking for enlightenment, not a bunch of spin and foul language.

You’ll also see new feature called “snap shots”. I added it because I think it’s helpful, but some of you might find it annoying. Let me know which way you lean and I’ll either keep it or disable it depending on you’re feedback.

And last but not least, just to show you what a complete technology geek I am, you may notice a new little Icon in your URL line and bookmarks. How a little 16×16 pixel icon gets me jazzed I really couldn’t say, but I think it’s cool and it only took me about 15 minutes to create and implement yesterday afternoon while watching football.

There is more to come, and like I told you last week, one of the reasons I love this new format is because of the way I can customize and expand it. It will always be a work in progress.

In the meantime, I’m going to go check out this new G1 at a local store and may see if I can take it for a spin.

Doug & Ronda Bauknight
AKA: TravelPro
Travel Agent / Networker
Phone: 678.458.5812

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Tags: Google, ShopSavvy, T-Mobile G1, Wikitude

This entry was posted on Monday, November 10th, 2008 at 7:00 am and is filed under GPS, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.