One of the current themes in the blogging world these days is how iPhone 2.0 will be the second coming of location services on handsets. I have a PILE of location enabled handsets already, with location based apps popping out the ears – maps, and navigation being the biggies. We discuss what would it take to for iPhone to really drive this forward that say, Nokia, isn’t already doing. One of the biggest issues is the time required to get a fix. Wouldn’t a network based location service be a better choice for consumers?
Secondly, one of the themes that’s on my mind these days is privacy, and individual rights. This morning we discuss two more stories around these issues:
The first is the cell phone study that secretly tracked 100K people to find out what they did during the day… anonymously, of course. And without their permission. Carriers already track this data. We ask whether there is an ethical issue around releasing it in this form. More to the point, however… what are the rules that govern the collection of this data, and how are those rules made?
The second is for Canadian listeners. Industry minister Jim Prentice is gearing up (amidst public protest) to try to introduce another copyright reform bill in Canada. Michael Geist has dubbed it the Canadian DMCA. We talk about copyright reform, the success or failure of the DMCA in the US, and what Prentice’s bill might mean to us here in the Great White North.
With any luck, the bill won’t be introduced before summer.
On the call: Hudson Barton, Don Eidse, Tom McCarthy, Dan York, Dameon Welch-Abernathy, Roland Hanbury, Jeanette Fisher, David Brown, Adam Somer, Jeb Brilliant, Greg Manto, Bill Volk, James Body, Neal Saferstein, Jonathan Jensen, Frank Abrams, and … Jeff
Alec Saunders is the Vice President of Developer Relations for BlackBerry make Research in Motion. This is his personal blog, with his personal viewpoints. Prior to this Alec was the CEO and co-founder of Calliflower — the easiest way to hold a meeting, online, on a conference call, or on the go. A double-decade veteran of product management and marketing, he spent nine years at Microsoft where he helped launch Windows 95, the first two versions of Internet Explorer, the Universal Plug and Play initiative, the push into home markets, opt-in email marketing and what might well go down in history as the very first direct email list ever.
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Great conversation! Dad