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Yes, OS locate is just as good / better but they don’t have the marketing budget so people don’t put it on their phone.
That is why they also use the PhoneFind tool quite a bit as it prompts user to give permission before location is sent.
The problem I have is hijacking mountain rescue, RNLI and ambulance services to do their marketing.
Lets face it assigning 3 words to every 3mx3m grid on say the UK grid isn't rocket science... and with a list of reserved words for pronunciation etc. is pretty trivial and did we not have 10 individual NHS Ambulance Trusts easily achievable. Any undergrad could do it as a final year project... then add in the air ambulance, mountain rescue, lowland rescue, RNLI etc. all for free allowing a reversible emergency services version without the restrictions.
Chuck in a linguistics grad and add 2 factor auth for location (2nd set of words) and you'd have a fully functional system.
I read the title (and then the thread) but got me thinking what3words really wouldn't be suitable in these situations.
rope.slightly.frayed
one.last.run
bit.more.speed
walking.flip.flops
helmets.are.dangerous (that's a 3m square somewhere in gentrified Edinburgh, I think)
Yes, it's a rather sub-par solution. Doesn't sound like their business model would survive any major re-jigging of the way it works either. However, if I found myself in a spot of bother and the call handler insisted on using W3W exclusively, I would be suggesting (if compos mentis) we get a few 3-word combos to prevent any confusion.
take.money.run
The problem I have is hijacking mountain rescue, RNLI and ambulance services to do their marketing.
Yep...
franksinatra
Steve, just out of curiosity, do you know if they phoned police or ambulance? It shouldn’t matter but, unfortunately it does sometimes make a difference.
The situation you describe is not the fault of W3W, it is entirely the fault of the control room training or process.
Dunno TBH but I can ask Tom next time I see him. He does this reasonably often with ambulances and air ambulance so he knows the drill so to speak but he was dumbfounded by this.
The situation you describe is not the fault of W3W, it is entirely the fault of the control room training or process.
I'm not sure.. the licensing prohibits reserve engineering and in the deep 6pt grey text that is (or was - didn't check if its changed) defined as displaying a W3W location next to a resolvable geolocation.
Equally I don't know what the deal was with SWASFT for the pilot .. were they allowed to cross reference or is this explicitly banned and what are the contrac tual obligations and potential fines if they do?
In a sensible world this would have been done with the people at the pointy end in on the loop but sadly in todays "post-fact" UK I have little confidence. It seems like a small thing..like who paid for Boris' wallpaper (for example) but the concerning thing is how these things are just accepted...
My mate volunteers on DORSaR so that overlaps SWASFT and he's not happy either though as you said earlier he seems to spend more time searching for people who'd rather not be found.
Lets face it assigning 3 words to every 3mx3m grid on say the UK grid isn’t rocket science… and with a list of reserved words for pronunciation etc. is pretty trivial and did we not have 10 individual NHS Ambulance Trusts easily achievable. Any undergrad could do it as a final year project… then add in the air ambulance, mountain rescue, lowland rescue, RNLI etc. all for free allowing a reversible emergency services version without the restrictions.
Chuck in a linguistics grad and add 2 factor auth for location (2nd set of words) and you’d have a fully functional system.
Yep, all you are missing then is the multi million pound marketing budget to get vast numbers of users to install it on their phones
Why is lat/long particularly bad for mountain rescue?
Only asking as my watch can (with two button presses) display and save this.
Never had to call MR, but I had naively assumed that if on my own and injured I could use the watch like this, and the phone as a phone.
(Also chance of phone screen damage etc)
Yes, it’s a rather sub-par solution
No single system is fault free. Most people don't know what a Lat/Long is and TBH it appears that MRT and rescue services don't trust people to give accurate ones in an emergency anyway, even Find-phone needs permission and a working phone, street names and road numbers are confusable and similarly numbered in geographical areas. As @franksinatra pointed out, it's just one part of group of systems that's used.
It’s call it what you want if it makes you feel better but. It’s copying someone else’s IP and then opensourcing it. That’s not security purposes -thata just a handy attempt at defence of the situation.
Its not copying someone IP any more than every cad software or spreadsheet or is a copy of IP of whoever did the first ever Cad, spreadsheet etc. It was independently redeveloped. We don't have software patents because trying to patent a algorithm is trying to patent maths.
They have had someone show the weakness in their software and used aggressive legal methods to try and hide it because it spoils their marketing front.
Why is lat/long particularly bad for mountain rescue?
I don't have a platform to easily convert it to a usable plot on the map, in particular to overlay to OS and get a GR. I am sure such a platform does exist but it is not in routine use. Lat/Long is also precious about space, hyphens, colons etc so lots of opportunity for error from caller, police call handler or from me.
When I enter OS GR or W3W in our system it automatically drops a pin on the OS map. Doing so with Lat/Long will take time and I'd prefer to use that time coordinating the response.
drink.verification.can
As an aside, there are some interesting trials of technology which picks up a phone which has no signal but is sending out data as it tries to find a signal. If we can get that small enough to stick on a drone it will be amazing in poor signal areas.
I've wondered whether you could get a nano-cell on a drone to give you temporary cover which would enable you to not only find them but communicate with them...
There’s a workaround for W3W. It’s very unlikely you will find 2 sets of confusable pairs adjacent to each other, so if you give the W3W combo in 2 spots next to each other (i.e that are 3m apart), you should be pretty confident in the location. Not going to work if you’re unable to move, but oftentimes that’s not the case.
You can do it without moving on the app. MIght not be too easy if your alone, freezing and in pain but its possible and still easier than some alternatives in that scenario.
Sounds a bit harsh to pick on a handful of examples where it has failed when it has been used been used countless times without issue.
I've used it to rescue my son and his mates after a mechanical on more than one occasion. It is a pretty good alternative to "you know that path we went down that day", "the one by the farmers field", "the one with the trees at the end" etc.
Its not copying someone IP any more than every cad software or spreadsheet or is a copy of IP of whoever did the first ever Cad, spreadsheet etc. It was independently redeveloped. We don’t have software patents because trying to patent a algorithm is trying to patent maths.
Some jurisdictions (the US in particular) do directly allow software patents. Even in the UK there are mechanisms by which software can be patented. Whether this algorithm is patentable will depend on how novel and inventive it is - the same would have been true for the first-ever s/sheet or cad package, or one that does something special; generally now those types of software recognise that the need for interoperability is greater than the need to exclude competition.
However, even if it is not patentable - if someone has used the W3W API to help reverse engineer the words/algorithm it uses then its a breach of their T&Cs and they shouldn't be surprised if commercial companies decide to enforce their T&Cs. Someone could make an "other3words" app that uses the same concept but results in different words and the question then is patentability (unless they've literally copied the code) but if they make "same3words" and its used the W3W app or Api to generate those same 3 words they are on tricky ground.
I’ve wondered whether you could get a nano-cell on a drone to give you temporary cover which would enable you to not only find them but communicate with them…
The drone stuff is all quite new and really really interesting. Predictably it is all about weight v battery trade off. You can attach anything you want but if it is heavy you reduce the flying time dramatically. I like your idea but suspect the phone companies will make it very hard to implement. Knowing where someone is it the main thing and the newest drone has a speaker on it so we can have one way comms, I expect it will be used mainly to tell people to not move, just sit down and wait for us!
Why is lat/long particularly bad for mountain rescue?
Other than people transposing digits ...
There is no such thing as a unique lat/lon because the earth is not a perfect sphere.
Depending where you are you can be hundreds of metres to kilometers out depending what datum is used.
The drone stuff is all quite new and really really interesting. Predictably it is all about weight v battery trade off.
Issue free lures to hikers then use a trained raptor... 😉
The recent incident I was was involved with I believe the caller asked for ambulance, we/I gave the call handler Grid and what three words (they requested WTW) and they got the air ambulance on the way. They alerted Mountain Rescue rocked up later and coastguard winched the casualty.
@big_n_daft - I think you've illustrated frank's point nicely there. You will get help (barring any stevexc type oddities) either way - but the temptation to think - someone is hurt call the Ambulance might not be the fastest way to get the best help. The ambulance service call handler's temptation is to deploy ambulance service resources and do their best to help. They'll call "their" air ambulance, rather than contacting kinloss to get CG helo which can winch a casualty so doesn't need to land. Round here, they'll deploy their SORT (I think similar to HART in England?) who will mobilise their team from quite far away with no local knowledge, and bring an all-terrain-vehicle, or send the nearest standard ambulance where two people then walk in with as much kit as they can carry before calling for backup (assuming, of course, they can find you).
I think most of us get that Police (MRT) is who you call when very remote and "in the mountains". Trail centre - a mile from the nearest road? Local woods in an area quite far from the mountains? And then as someone who occasionally organises events in remote spots I think it is worth asking yourself who would we call here (casualty back at car park = ambulance; casualty out on the hill path - might depend on injuries and how accessible).
Poly, that is spot on. Often the ambulance service will only call MRT when they have exhausted their own options. Going via the Police / MRT route you will get MRT mobilised quicker. This situation is improving and ambulance are getting better at calling us sooner but they are very keen to use SORT as much as possible, even if this isn't the best or closet resource for the job.
Advanced Mobile Location is great but it will tell you where the caller is, not where the casualty is. Often they will be the same - but there are times when the caller has had to walk/ride a considerable way to get signal - or perhaps in a panic has called a third party first (at ~13/14 my son called his mother rather than the ambulance when his friend knocked himself out in a crash).
Why is lat/long particularly bad for mountain rescue?
Echoing what Steve said.
There is no one lat/long, you would need to also communicate what datum is being used. Wikipedia
It's most likely you are using WGS 84, but do you know that and does the person at the other end of the phone.
And I'm plucking this as vague memory from when I got my Garmin and was messing around with gpsbabel and Google maps and I think set the datum as a pref on the Garmin because that seemed to be the most common or what Google maps used. But I had to Google to get the datum name now.
They’ll call “their” air ambulance, rather than contacting kinloss to get CG helo which can winch a casualty so doesn’t need to land.
The CG wouldn't be able to winch the casualty without assistance in this case. Air ambulance was there in 30mins +10 getting to the point where the casualty was, MRT was another 30 mins before their first people got to the casualty. CG was initiated by air ambulance. It arrived after the MRT.
All the helo support was on the edge for flying conditions.
In this case it all worked to get the casualty off the hill.
You'll need to watch the telly to get the rest
My view is that relying on one system to get a location is a fundamental error. Not mobilising because you need the location from a proprietary system and no other source is verging on negligence.
Well, I’m shocked to hear it’s absolutely not flawless.
You will get help (barring any stevexc type oddities) either way
As they ingrain the system into emergency services and remove the choices then these oddities will start becoming the norm.
The situation you describe is not the fault of W3W, it is entirely the fault of the control room training or process.
So what did the control room person/process do BEFORE?
Indeed why do we need a control room person (even a minimally trained one) if we have w3w???
Much as I know why (you have explained) I doubt the person signing the contract is going to actually consult you...
I don’t have a platform to easily convert it to a usable plot on the map, in particular to overlay to OS and get a GR. I am sure such a platform does exist but it is not in routine use.
Literally hundreds ... here is a 1mx1m square (Gisburn Forest car park) this uses WGS84 datum that is the same used by your phone.
https://gridreferencefinder.com/os.php#gr=SD7447255815|Point_s_A|1
Grid Reference
SD 74472 55815
Grid Reference (6 figure)
SD744558
X (Easting) , Y (Northing)
374472 , 455815
Latitude , Longitude (decimal)
53.997732 , -2.3908960
Latitude , Longitude (degs, mins, secs)
53°59′52″N , 002°23′27″W
What3Words : bitters.dumplings.courier
Address (near) :
The Hub, The 8, Easington, Ribble Valley, Lancashire, North West England, England, BB7 4TS, United Kingdom
Postcode (nearest) : BB7 4TS
...And we're off...
As they ingrain the system into emergency services and remove the choices
Any evidence of emergency services being forced to use W3W only? Apart from in your head?
I don’t have a platform to easily convert it to a usable plot on the map, in particular to overlay to OS and get a GR. I am sure such a platform does exist but it is not in routine use.
You can put lat longs straight into google, both decimal and degrees. Don't even need to be in Google maps
nickc
Any evidence of emergency services being forced to use W3W only? Apart from in your head?
Either forced or refusing ... however given the business model for W3W and stated aims to investors then forced seems to be the most likely.
Why is lat/long particularly bad for mountain rescue?
Only asking as my watch can (with two button presses) display and save this.
Never had to call MR, but I had naively assumed that if on my own and injured I could use the watch like this, and the phone as a phone.
(Also chance of phone screen damage etc)
Most navigation and/or "describing where you are" scenarios require some form of knowledge from the person making the call. W3W was (or at least was marketed as) a way of avoiding that as in "any idiot can use it".
Lat/Long, you need to know the datum system, there's a very high chance of transposing digits, most people have no idea how to access that info on their phone anyway.
OS grid reference coordinates are good if delivered by a GPS (with the OS basemap fitted!), less reliable if read out while holding an A3 map that's flapping around in the breeze (and if the latter, you actually have to have fairly decent map reading skills).
Postcode is fine in urban areas (although if you have an accident on the side of a road you're unlikely to know the postcode without asking), rural areas can be very hit and miss where a postcode can refer to a much larger area.
A friend had to call an ambulance on a road ride a while ago when one of her riding mates crashed on a descent. She tried to give them a W3W but the operator seemed clueless about it and kept asking for a postcode as it was the only thing the ambulance satnav could understand. On a random road in the Trough of Bowland with no buildings around, she couldn't give a postcode.
With W3W, assuming the person making the call can move by 3+ metres, surely you could just give 2 or 3 references next to each other?
That said, I'm not a fan of W3W either because of their marketing and I can see a point where, having forced MR and emergency services into using it, they suddenly start to charge for it.
however given the business model for W3W and stated aims to investors then forced seems to be the most likely.
They’re not being forced.
Hopefully that post above containing a crossreference from a 3 word location to an explicit location in another reference won't cause any legal threats.
It is against their T+C and a breach of their IP.
and I can see a point where, having forced MR and emergency services into using it, they suddenly start to charge for it.
Emergency services aren't being forced into using it.
A friend had to call an ambulance on a road ride a while ago when one of her riding mates crashed on a descent. She tried to give them a W3W but the operator seemed clueless about it and kept asking for a postcode as it was the only thing the ambulance satnav could understand. On a random road in the Trough of Bowland with no buildings around, she couldn’t give a postcode.
This should give a postcode if your phone knows its location and has data:
https://www.whatsmypostcode.com/
I was in a serious accident last week involving a head injury. I had no clue where I was (even though I commuted down the road 1000s of times) and there was no way I could have given a grid reference. If I had had w3w I could have just about done that thankfully i was with someone who guided the emergency services to me.
OS grid reference coordinates are good if delivered by a GPS (with the OS basemap fitted!), less reliable if read out while holding an A3 map that’s flapping around in the breeze (and if the latter, you actually have to have fairly decent map reading skills).
Or just read them off the phone app. No map needed.
Emergency services aren’t being forced into using it.
Do you have any proof of that?
Given you don't give a toss the NHS were forced to use the propriety system for the vaccine SMS's I can't see why you'd care.
It seems you are all for forcing the NHS/Emergency services into using stuff by removing the options or perhaps it's just you can't wait for the NHS to be sold off to US companies ???
Either forced or refusing … however given the business model for W3W and stated aims to investors then forced seems to be the most likely.
That's what worries me about W3W, they are set up as a business with investors that will want a return on that soon. I cannot see any other way for those investments to be recouped other than charging for access to their service, either by charging for each request or for downloading the app. The danger point will be if/when the emergency services switch to relying on it as their main location tool, that will then give W3W the green light to monetise the system. If that point is reached then I hope there is legal protections to stop the Emergency Services essentially being held over a barrel when people in distress quote 3 words at the operator but they cannot access the system due to monetary issues. I know that is a worse-case scenario but it is possible. Hopefully some enterprising student/hobbyist will recognise that and come up with an open/free alternative that is either similarly unique or links into a few current systems to remove any possible errors.
As always you have to look behind the product to get the whole picture.
Another MR person here and we had an incident yesterday that demonstrates a lot of the quirks and potential pitfalls of W3W and how location information gets handled. Caller had phoned 999 for an ambulance and given a location description, I think the ambulance control call handler may have then generated a W3W (possibly based on postcode - which can cover big areas). The ambulance crew got sent W3W and description, and being familiar with the patch realised the W3W was guff and went straight to location. They also asked control to activate MR and that was triggered via SARCall, but with only the W3W location, which instantly looked wrong as you can't fall from rocks in the middle of flat fields. Incident Controller then struggled to get through to control room to get the rest of location info (ie description), which we got just before I set off in the wrong direction in a vehicle. Also meanwhile the air ambulance (who probably self tasked) was hovering over the (wrong) W3W location until redirected by the ambulance crew on the ground.*
As said - all in all it's better to phone the police (who also love W3W btw) as they take the information and pass it straight on with no 'translation'. Tends to work more smoothly when that happens and the right resources turn up when and where they are needed. W3W is already way too embedded to roll back at all - so we just need to have good ways of cross checking locations and try and make sure call handler training covers what it needs to.
* I had a camera in my face for that one - so now everyone will be able to enjoy my scrabbling in my pockets to find a mask and take a handover from a paramedic after running up a hill 😉
Emergency services aren’t being forced into using it.
Fair enough, I was going off what seems to be a commonly occurring / oft-repeated comment on the topic.
Do you have any proof of that?
Well, they’re not I’ve spent a good bit of time in the EOC the last year and was on standby to head down last night for a possible incident. They can use W3W, postcode, OS Grid reference and longitude latitude. They are not forced to use one system, they can choose from the options.
Hopefully some enterprising student/hobbyist will recognise that and come up with an open/free alternative that is either similarly unique
there are open systems that are similarly unique
indeed the patent report I read even references one as prior art from about 6-7 years prior
and that ignores the other prior art and not non-obvious claims made such as dividing up the map/globe in to arbitrary sized boxes and assigning unique comibinations to those boxes.
there's even a free open one in goggle maps, that just simply has not been pushed whatsoever (although it tends to show for waypoints in google maps rather than dropping a pin, or in the "what's here" option)
but sadly the Scafell Pike flip-flop hikers that can't get back in time for Corrie/Eastenders, won;t have the intelligence to dictate 6 words/numbers using the NATO alphabet, but can handle 3 words that often make funny sounding combinations.
@stevextc, mate, get your head sorted, it’s full of nonsense.
You stated that (after a year of preparation) there was only one system that GP's and pharmacies were allowed to use as a SMS gateway... and you don't seem to care how that occurred or who decided it or how suddenly after a year it was such a panic it had to be single sourced from the only company on the procurement list.
It doesn't even seem to have crossed your mind to ask who made that decision and what clinical expertise they had and why hundreds of better qualified companies were not put on the VIP list or for that matter why companies that make ventilators or PPE were excluded from bidding but a vacuum cleaner company not only got put on the VIP list but was calling the PM directly for some tax readjustments.
Now you personally don't have to care (or perhaps you have shares and do) but that doesn't give you the right to criticise people who do care and infer they need their head sorting or any other euphemism you care to use.
Edited. I'm not responding to you anymore
andytherocketeer
there are open systems that are similarly unique
There are loads and have been for years... its not a new or unique concept.
The only way this can possibly make money is by making it non optional - that is the only novel thing about it and the fact they refuse to publish the lists. (RM postcodes are proprietary but you can purchase the list and use it)