Sunday, 2 June 2013

BBC Questions To Which The Answer Is 'Nooooo, You Idiots!' Part 258

Walking and texting is leading to a spate of collision-related injuries. Could a new app be the answer?
I'm gonna go out on a limb here, but... probably not!
We've all done it.You're walking down the street and the familiar beep of an incoming text becomes too tempting to resist. As you start to fire off a quick reply - bam! You clash shoulders with a fellow pedestrian doing exactly the same.
Nope. Never done it. Sorry, BBC.
"What we observed in our experiments is that in 60% of cases, people avoided obstacles in a safer way. That's up from 20% [without CrashAlert]," says CrashAlert's inventor Dr Juan David Hincapié-Ramos from the University of Manitoba.
You could get it up to 100% if they just put down the bloody phone and looked where they were going!

Lord knows, London Underground would love it if they did:
Passengers on the London Underground have been warned to keep better hold of their smartphones after dropped devices have caused delays in service.
Anecdotal evidence from Tube drivers and staff suggests such incidents have been increasing since January.
Why since January? Well, they've finally finished rolling out wi-fi in stations!

/facepalm

Someone needs to start up a business giving lessons in this stuff...

H/T: CJ Nerd via email
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9 comments:

  1. Anonymous2 June 2013 at 12:41

    Don't get me started on these bloody mobile addicts.

    You call in at the motorway service area for a pee and coffee and you have to avoid bloody zombies meandering aimlessly out of the bogs staring into their infernal bloody devices.

    Whats so blasted important, the urge to Tweet breaking news about a successful bowel movement?

    Give me strength.

    Judd

    ReplyDelete
  2. Longrider2 June 2013 at 17:16

    Nope. Never done it.

    Me neither.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Mark Wadsworth2 June 2013 at 17:38

    No I've never done it.

    And my Nokia 110 is a gentleman's mobile 'phone, it doesn't do "apps".

    ReplyDelete
  4. Macheath2 June 2013 at 20:41

    If ever there was a case for letting natural selection take its course...

    ReplyDelete
  5. JuliaM3 June 2013 at 05:47

    "If ever there was a case for letting natural selection take its course..."

    Quite so! Future Darwin Award winners..

    ReplyDelete
  6. Robert3 June 2013 at 12:59

    I'm a smartphone user (using it to read blogs like this and yours, Mark, among others), but when the train pulls into the station, the phone goes into my pocket while I board. Why it doesn't occur to other people to perform this simple manoeuvre, I don't know.
    As for texting while walking down the street, just because it's called a mobile phone doesn't you have to use it all the time you're mobile.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Furor Teutonicus3 June 2013 at 13:46

    XX We've all done it.You're walking down the street and the familiar beep of an incoming text becomes too tempting to resist.XX

    Wha'????

    Is this guy on acid or what?

    ReplyDelete
  8. John Pickworth4 June 2013 at 01:44

    And also...

    Walking along with a £600 mobile in your hand while being completely unaware of what's around you is... well, lets just say its an invitation which will lead ultimately to you needing change for a public phone very soon. And maybe some bandaging of sorts.

    ReplyDelete
  9. JuliaM5 June 2013 at 17:34

    "As for texting while walking down the street, just because it's called a mobile phone doesn't you have to use it all the time..."

    I find I have to stop walking just to concentrate on a phone call, never mind anything else!

    "...an invitation which will lead ultimately to you needing change for a public phone very soon. And maybe some bandaging of sorts."

    Heh!



    ""

    ReplyDelete