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MIT finds another way to facilitate stalking on campus

I'm sure you all knew about this by now (especially if you read Engadget like I do), MIT researchers unveiled a new social networking application called iFIND that allows anyone to locate a person on MIT's campus via WiFi.

As WiFi becomes more ubiquitous, more students and faculty are spending more time away from their workstations and working in areas such as coffee shops, cafes, and the quads. Of course, use of the application is voluntary. People can choose whether or not they would like to be easily located via WiFi access points as the application depends on the device not a central server.

Although this application only had laptop computers in mind, this concept could easily be applied to mobile platforms such as mobile phones and PDAs. Nowadays, the college student could either call their friends or text them to find them on campus. UChicago's campus do not have as many WiFi access points like MIT, but as more students choose to buy laptops rather than desktops for college, I can see this trend changing. There is only so much information about a location that you can convey through spoken or written communcation. Especially on campuses or venues that are very large, it is sometimes just more simple to have a location marked on a map to avoid confusion and/or miscommunication.

In addition, MIT's new application could be applied to personal information management as well. Just imagine, you could even find out the name of the cute girl or guy and where she or he lives... (just kidding). Revolutionary? That verdict is still out. There are already numerous location-based tracking service available for mobile platforms (see earlier entries) and on the web (i.e. dodgeball). Have they been embraced fully? Not that I've seen or experienced. Personally, I don't think companies have fully figured out how to combine these features into a product that a college student would be interested in buying or can even afford. Maybe it would be better if you target the young professionals straight out of college as this group usually upgrades their choice of consumer products given that this group has more disposable income.

posted by Koh @ 1:03 PM