The RobotCar U.K. project is using a modified Nissan Leaf, an all-electric vehicle, which is fitted with around £5,000 ($7,750) worth of prototype navigation equipment. That system includes a controller PC in the trunk — which can control every function of the car — as well as cameras in the front, lasers discreetly tucked under the front and rear bumpers, and an iPad for the user interface up front.

In time, the researchers hope to develop an autonomous navigation system that costs just £100.

“We are working on a low-cost ‘auto drive’ navigation system, that doesn’t depend on GPS, done with discreet sensors that are getting cheaper all the time. It’s easy to imagine that this kind of technology could be in a car you could buy,” Professor Paul Newman, the project’s co-leader, said in a statement.

Mapping and learning

The system doesn’t use GPS because the satellite-based system is not accurate enough for the researchers’ needs. Instead, twin cameras keep an eye on the road ahead for pedestrians and so on, while the lasers create a three-dimensional map of the world around the car — this is a similar approach to that taken by Google in its autonomous vehicle research, except far cheaper (Google’s LIDAR unit alone costs $70,000) and less conspicuous.

This is where the car’s part-time autonomy comes in — at least in city environments. As Newman put it:

“Our approach is made possible because of advances in 3D laser mapping that enable an affordable car-based robotic system to rapidly build up a detailed picture of its surroundings. Because our cities don’t change very quickly robotic vehicles will know and look out for familiar structures as they pass by so that they can ask a human driver, ‘I know this route, do you want me to drive?’, and the driver can choose to let the technology take over.”

It’s really a matter of machine learning, the science of probability and good guesswork; and the data the researchers are using comes from the cameras and lasers, but also from road plans, aerial photographs and internet queries. The car needs to learn its environment before it can, metaphorically speaking, take the wheel. (The driver can always take back control by tapping the brakes.)

Check out this video showing car driving through a gradually-updating “semantic prior map” — in other words, all the fixed stuff such as road markings, curb locations and so on, with dynamic objects being mapped along the way:

As for next steps, the team will try to get the system to understand traffic flows and learn how to evaluate best routes.

“Whilst our technology won’t be in a car showroom near you any time soon, and there’s lots more work to do, it shows the potential for this kind of affordable robotic system that could make our car journeys safer, more efficient, and more pleasant for drivers,” Newman said.

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There are plenty of other ways to do this type of task, but what I like about Smart WiFi Toggler is that it doesn’t require your GPS radio to be on. Other apps use the GPS signal to determine when you’ve left home, for example, and then turn off Wi-Fi for you.

I don’t like that approach because I only use the GPS radio when I need to: I don’t want the radio on all the time. Smart WiFi Toggler simply uses the already-on cellular radio to triangulate your location and take the appropriate actions. This method isn’t as precise for location, but in this case, it doesn’t need to be.

You can’t use this app for a Wi-Fi only Nexus 7 tablet because there’s no cellular radio. But all Nexus 7 tablets may soon get the anticipated landscape dock. Android Central got a tip about the dock appearing on a Japanese Asus site; Asus builds the Nexus 7 for Google.

On the site is information suggesting availability for the dock this month. The cost when converted from yen to dollars is $41 but I suspect the US price to be $49. Hopefully, I’m wrong and it comes in less than that, but either way, the dock looks handy for watching video and other activities in landscape mode.

One of those activities could be running the Xbox SmartGlass application, which just added support for the Nexus 7 this past week. The software adds a second-screen experience to Microsoft’s Xbox 360 console, providing additional information to any content being consumed. It also allows you to control your Xbox and lets you use the Nexus 7 as an on-screen keyboard for the console. I haven’t used this free app yet, so I can’t offer any opinion on the value of the app; if any readers have used it, I’d love to hear if it’s worth a try!

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The company, which specializes in real-time traffic data, powers a wide variety of in-vehicle navigation systems, mobile apps, commercial fleet management systems and even Google Maps. The secret behind Inrix’s success that it collects lots of data from lots of drivers in order to help everyone get where they’re going faster. But saving commuters driving time is just the beginning of the company’s plans. It thinks traffic data can help change a wide variety of industries, maybe even the world.

100 million devices and 1.8 million miles of road

That a traffic-data company could contribute to such macro-level change might seem laughable until you get a sense of Inrix’s scale. According to founder and CEO Bryan Mistele, 6 of the 8 auto companies with built-in navigations systems (including Ford, BMW and Audi) use and share Inrix data, as do 8 of the 12 top navigation apps in Apple’s App Store (including MapQuest, Garmin, Microsoft and Telenav). Many of the commercial trucks we see on the streets are sharing data with Inrix too, and even “dumb” phones without GPS and internet connections are sharing location data with the company through cell towers.

All told, the company counts more than 100 million endpoints as its data sources and covers more than 1.8 million miles of road worldwide, Mistele said. Its total volume of traffic data, which the company crunches through constantly to generate real-time information, is more than 500TB. It runs its own homemade big data infrastructure, Mistele says, because “there are no off-the-shelf packages [not even Hadoop] that in real time can process that amount of data.”

From real-time to predicting the future

And generating real-time traffic conditions is only a portion of what Inrix provides to the customers that pay for its services. The company also brings in, among other sources, weather data, accident data and sensor data in order to provide insights into how traffic is likely to shape up. By factoring in the location, number of cars involved and whether there are injuries, for example, Mistele said Inrix can predict how long an accident will hold up traffic at a given location.

Because it has so much historical information from such a broad set of sources, Inrix is also able discern reality from situations that might confuse models that are only concerned with whether vehicles are moving or stopped. Mistele said the system is smart enough to know that a car sitting at a stoplight on an arterial road is not akin to a car stuck in a traffic jam on a highway, or that taxi cabs and UPS trucks stopping and going are not signs of stop-and-go traffic conditions.

Disrupting industries, and urban sprawl

Aside from consumer navigation apps and those helping commercial drivers manage their delivery schedules, a number of state, regional municipal and even national governments use Inrix’s analytic services to help gauge a number of issues relating to road management. Mistele said the company has actually disrupted the media industry, too, by helping spur the end of traffic helicoptors and “traffic on the nines” on local radio stations. For customers like Clear Channel, it’s just a lot cheaper, easier and more effective to feed their on-air talent with real-time data and information that someone else has put together.

“This is a space where there has been a complete transformation [thanks to big data and crowd sourcing],” Mistele said.

As great as it is helping people get from Point A to Point B, though, being able to get a handle on traffic data could have even further-ranging effects. Insurance companies can use the data to determine more-accurate rates, and some hedge funds are using Inrix’s data as a means for determining economic health — more drivers during rush hour means more people working, Mistele explained. During the London Olympics, data from mobile devices helped officials monitor the movement of people, not traffic, throughout the city.

A shot of Xerox’s City Manager for parking

As cities continue to grow and congestion becomes an even bigger problem in terms of decreasing productivity and increasing pollution, it’s that kind of data from companies such as Inrix (or competitors Nokia Navteq and TomTom) that could help mitigate the effects. Xerox, for example, already uses Inrix data as part of its efforts to help cities improve urban planning around roads, mass transit and parking spaces. The more that city planners know about how, where and when their citizens move, the better they can plan transit systems that address those realities, or that can more easily respond when problems arise.

“Give people better data, give governments better data,” said Mistele, “and you can have a huge impact on one of the biggest of the biggest problems in our society.”

Feature image courtesy of Shutterstock user TonyV3112.

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Users of the $49.95 app — it’s a one-time fee — can supplement their navigation and traffic map needs with these new social location apps that are typically used in a standalone version. Link the TomTom app to your Foursquare account and you can find, navigate and check-in to Foursquare locations in a single app:

Find millions of exciting places to visit by searching with Foursquare, even if you are not a Foursquare user. Log into Foursquare and you can also check in at your destination so you don’t miss any points on your way to becoming its new mayor.

The same holds true for the Facebook Places integration from the last software update, making it easier and faster to find locations that friends have recommended.

Given that GPS-enabled smartphones and navigation software have provided a lower-cost option than single-purpose navigation devices, this is a smart move by TomTom. Adding both search and check-in features for Foursquare and Facebook adds value to users of both social networking services, allowing companies such as TomTom to not be shut out of revenues by Google Maps and other mobile apps that replace standalone GPS navigation devices.

This So-Lo-Mo trend is a concept we’ll be talking about in more detail next month at our Mobilize 2012 event in San Francisco. In particular, we’ll be chatting with Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff to better understand how the traditional location-based real estate market is moving towards a mobile-friendly environment with social networking opportunities.

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According to the Massachusetts Division of Standards, “there are no established measurement standards for [GPS's] current application and use in determining transportation costs similar to that of  approved measurement systems in taximeters and odometers.” The decision came after a “sting” operation snagged Uber in Cambridge.

Uber disclosed the news in its blog along with its response:

In essence the [Massachusetts] Division of Standards is claiming that until the National Institute of Standards and Technology has guidelines in place for GPS location technology, we cannot provide our application to the public. As we did extensive legal research prior to entering the city of Boston, it is our strong belief that the technology and service we offer does not violate existing law and regulations.

It’s not the first time Uber has faced trouble entering a new city — it got flak the taxi and limo commission in Washington, D.C. six months ago. Some in the Boston area suspect that complaints from local cab companies are at the root of this latest issue as well. Uber launched its service, which lets users summon a private car via a smartphone app, in San Francisco and is now available in 14 U.S. cities.

One commenter on the Uber blog wrote:

There. Aren’t. Enough. Cabs. In. This. City.  And the ones that are have drivers who get pissed when you try to use a *gasp* credit card. Not to mention, Boston cabs are the most expensive in NORTH AMERICA.

Uber could not be reached for comment, but it appears that the service continues. According to the blog:

Uber will continue full speed ahead with the mission of making Boston and the surrounding areas a great place to live and travel and the Commonwealth the Hub of cutting edge technology.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Ambernectar 13

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In a complaint filed Wednesday in Las Vegas, Silver State Intellectual Technologies Inc asked for an injunction and damages related to U.S .Patent 7475057 (“System and method for user navigation”) and U.S. Patent 7343165 (“GPS Publication Application Server”).

Both patents describe the process of pushing information from a remote server to a user based on the location of that user and show diagrams like this one:

Silver State’s short legal filing (embedded below) doesn’t describe how exactly Foursquare infringed on the patent. The popular app relies on location tracking technology to offer a service that lets users and their friends “check in” to restaurants, merchants and other physical locations.

The lawsuit comes at a time when so-called patent trolls like Silver State have become aggressive about suing promising young companies. Handcraft site Etsy and travel site Hipmunk, for instance, were “mugged on payday” when they were hit with patent suits earlier this summer.

Patent trolls like Silver State, more politely called “non-practicing entities,” don’t make anything but instead acquire patents in order to sue companies that do. The trolls’ targets often simply fold their cards and pay a licensing fee for the troll to go away rather than risk the expense of  a prolonged lawsuit even though recent research (via The Verge) suggests doing so may be a mistake.

Applications for the two Silver State patents were filed in 2000 and 2001 and were granted in 2008 and 2009. The named inventor, Michael Obradovich, transfered them to a shell company shortly after.

The shell company structure is advantageous to the patent holders because it’s typically impossible to tell who is collecting on the patent payouts and because their lack of assets or a real business makes them impervious to countersuits.

This is the second time Foursquare has been hit by a patent suit. Last year, another shell company sued it for allegedly infringing on a method for mobile shopping.

Silver State v Foursquare

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You can see the bankruptcy filing on TMF Associates’ blog (pdf), listing among its numerous creditors Boeing and Alcatel-Lucent, who have LightSquared on the hook for more than $7 million each for satellite and communications gear. The claim amounts from other creditors are much smaller, but there is a long list of them.

Philip Falcone, whose hedge fund Harbinger Capital owns LightSquared, foretold the filing last month when he stated that bankruptcy might be the safest option for the would-be carrier, allowing it to fend off its lenders while it tried to move its nationwide LTE launch forward. In February, the Federal Communications Commission yanked a critical waiver LightSquared needed to use its satellite spectrum for terrestrial 4G when opposition from government agencies and the GPS industry started stacking up. The issue was the potential interference caused by LightSquared’s high-powered network to the country’s global positioning system satellite signals in an adjacent band.

LightSquared has been fighting the decision, demanding that the FCC either green light its network or supply it with replacement airwaves. But given the industry, government and political outcry against the company, neither scenario is likely to happen.

That leaves LightSquared with a bunch of assets to get rid of in bankruptcy, and none of them are worth all that much. It has its satellites, which Boeing might retake possession of, and it has its spectrum, which was supposed to be its most valuable asset. If LightSquared’s gamble had paid off and the L-band repurposed for 4G use, those licenses would have been worth billions, but no mobile operator would buy them now.

There may be one exception. As TMF analyst Tim Farrar postulated in his blog, Dish Network might have a way of cleaning up LightSquared’s spectrum. Dish owns S-band satellite frequencies in a far-off band. If it could combine that spectrum with LightSquared’s L-band frequencies it might be able to pull off not just a workable, but an extremely high-capacity LTE network that would steer clear of the GPS bands entirely.

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At 2 p.m. on Monday, LightSquared will be in violation of its debt terms and will be forced into default, unless it gets another extension from its creditors or files for bankruptcy protection. According to the Journal, lenders want Philip Falcone, whose hedge fund Harbinger Capital is LightSquared’s primary owner, to agree to several terms, including stepping aside to make way for an independent board, ceding a large ownership stake of the company, and assuming personal liability for a future bankruptcy. Falcone has apparently agreed to the first term, but has balked at the others, leaving LightSquared few other options but bankruptcy.

LightSquared attempted to build a nationwide LTE network using satellite spectrum, but failed to get the final green light from regulators after a firestorm of controversy broke out. The GPS industry and many government agencies claimed that LightSquared’s high-power terrestrial 4G network would interfere with millions of commercial, industrial and government GPS devices. LightSquared’s spectrum sits right alongside the global positioning system band.

Without a full terrestrial network waiver, LightSquared’s primary asset, its spectrum, is worth little, but satellite broadband analyst Tim Farrar thinks there may be one interested party: Dish. In his blog, Farrar wrote that Dish might seek to pair its own S-band satellite frequencies with LightSquared’s L-band, creating an LTE network that can span an enormous chunk of airwaves. To make the deal palatable to regulators, Farrar said, Dish likely would need to guarantee the part of the L-band near GPS would remain off limits. But even if it sacrificed those airwaves Dish could still double the size of the downlink capacity.

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Cardo, based in Pittsburgh, PA, is a long-time manufacturer of motorcycle communications gear. This year, it added its first similar product for cyclists; the BK-1. The device looks like a typical Bluetooth earpiece for smartphones — in fact, it does work with handsets — but adds a small, wearable module that fits atop a bicycle helmet.

With up to three cyclists wearing the BK-1, riders can communicate wirelessly for up to 500 meters in a line of sight. Essentially, the device is a hands-free walkie-talkie using Bluetooth for communication between the earpiece and headset module with another wireless technology on unlicensed spectrum connecting the riders.

The BK-1 also connects to MP3 players and GPS devices over Bluetooth, although I’d never use the former function. I do run on the roads with music, but when riding, I like to hear the cars approaching from behind. The GPS feature could be handy, however as turn-by-turn navigation on a new ride would be extremely useful.

Cardo sells the direct BK-1 for $279 and offers a $479 two-pack called the BK-1 Duo. At that price only avid riders need apply to keep the conversation spinning.

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