Author Topic: what 3 words  (Read 58054 times)

rogerzilla

  • When n+1 gets out of hand
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #100 on: 17 February, 2020, 07:17:56 am »
I'm now in Coventry
Quick! Call the rescue services!
Hard work sometimes pays off in the end, but laziness ALWAYS pays off NOW.

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #101 on: 26 March, 2020, 02:50:03 pm »
This about the importance of addressing slums and informal settlements makes no mention of what 3 words. Which is not surprising as the importances it addresses do not include parcel delivery.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/mar/26/the-unlisted-how-people-without-an-address-are-stripped-of-their-basic-rights
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

citoyen

  • Occasionally rides a bike
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #102 on: 26 March, 2020, 03:54:34 pm »
Winter Wonderland, held in That London's Hyde Park during December, used W3W to help visitors locate the various different gates. I thought that was a pretty good use of the tech.
"The future's all yours, you lousy bicycles."

quixoticgeek

  • Mostly Harmless
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #103 on: 23 September, 2020, 11:59:38 am »

Some of you may find this week's episode of "99% invisible" worth listening to
 It's called "the address book" and it talks about addresses and what they mean and their history. It does me too what 3 words too.

https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/the-address-book/

J
--
Beer, bikes, and backpacking
http://b.42q.eu/

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #104 on: 22 January, 2021, 09:54:21 pm »
I remember reading or hearing about the WV example. It wasn't particularly surprising, given what I know of WV (never been there but had a colleague from there).
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

rogerzilla

  • When n+1 gets out of hand
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #105 on: 11 May, 2021, 10:22:47 am »
W3W can't actually find my address (some satnavs also believe the street stops at no.20, when it really goes up to about 48).

So I denounce it as a Bad System.
Hard work sometimes pays off in the end, but laziness ALWAYS pays off NOW.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #106 on: 11 May, 2021, 10:35:36 am »
It turns out What3Words claim that if you mishear a word the incorrect location will be obviously wrong is bollocks:
https://cybergibbons.com/security-2/why-what3words-is-not-suitable-for-safety-critical-applications/

They've also threatened legal action against one of the people who was bringing this to light:
https://twitter.com/AaronToponce/status/1388163176261246980

They want to keep the reverse-engineered version of their algorithm off the internet. That went well:
https://twitter.com/Cryptome_org/status/1388101996922744834

citoyen

  • Occasionally rides a bike
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #107 on: 11 May, 2021, 10:55:59 am »
It turns out What3Words claim that if you mishear a word the incorrect location will be obviously wrong is bollocks:
https://cybergibbons.com/security-2/why-what3words-is-not-suitable-for-safety-critical-applications/

This made me laugh:
https://twitter.com/chrki/status/1383465163399917569?s=20

As did this (already posted elsewhere):
https://twitter.com/what3rudewords?s=20
"The future's all yours, you lousy bicycles."

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #108 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:18:36 am »
A month or so ago I went round a street-based art exhibition (not street art, but sculpture and similar placed in gardens where they were visible to the public). The organisers had given the locations in what3words. That seems like a decent use for the system: no safety implications, probably not even any time pressure, and communicated in written form. Mind you, they'd also given conventional street addresses, which is what I'd used. In fact, w3w is supposedly aimed primarily at street-less or address-less areas, so definitely not urban areas in Europe.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #109 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:21:19 am »
What astounds me is that they only need to use 40,000 words, yet they resort to plurals. Perhaps they wanted to reduce the numer of syllables used.
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #110 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:36:40 am »
The core English vocabulary is only a few thousand words before you get into obscure and technical stuff.

If they've gone for 5 words they've only need about 600 for the same size data encoding.

Or 10 letters of the phonetic alphabet.

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #111 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:40:06 am »
"Hello, can you down load the w3w app and tell us what it says"

"OK. Hang on"


"It says 'incomprehensibility.floccinaucinihilipilification.antidisestablishmentarianism'"

It is simpler than it looks.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #112 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:51:19 am »
Solution looking for a problem.

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #113 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:53:40 am »
Solution looking for monetisation.
It is simpler than it looks.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #114 on: 11 May, 2021, 11:58:48 am »
This made me laugh:
https://twitter.com/chrki/status/1383465163399917569?s=20

9 miles for skipping an "s" at the end of the last word is not that bad! We live in a place in central France where our third word also ends with an "s" . If you skip that letter, I just checked it out, you end up in Saudi Arabia  :o

A

Blodwyn Pig

  • what a nice chap
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #115 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:08:21 pm »


"It says 'ncomprehensibility.floccinaucinihilipilification.antidisestablishmentarianism'"

That's easy for you to say!

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #116 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:12:27 pm »
I missed a letter out at the beginning!!
It is simpler than it looks.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #117 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:14:18 pm »
Is this thing supposed to be used in the non English speaking world, or in places where people tend not to indulge in leisure activities in the middle of nowhere?

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #118 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:18:27 pm »
Is this thing supposed to be used in the non English speaking world, or in places where people tend not to indulge in leisure activities in the middle of nowhere?

Yep

https://what3words.com/news/blog/what3words-voice-is-now-available-in-over-20-languages/
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

Blodwyn Pig

  • what a nice chap
Re: what 3 words
« Reply #119 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:20:16 pm »
We were out walking with some chums, down at Battle, on the 1066 trail, couple of weeks ago, been t'pub, and half way back, came across a couple of lads, (twins) , on their MTB's, who were staying at t'campsite.  any how,  one had gone o'er the top, on a speedy descent (tut tut, t'was a footpath) and was in a bad way.  One had called his father,  who was on his way, lad had concusion,broken wrist, and swollen face, and kept trying to fall asleep. Dad called for medics, and to get his location, we gave the call centre a six figure grid ref off the os map.........silence........wasssat????????,  ain't ya got the ''what free words app?'   .  ?????????????????????
there were 7 adults, and none of us had ever heard of it. Anyway, duly downloaded, in a crap signal area' and the ambulance was waiting on the road,  after we walked him in a dozy state, about 2 miles.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #120 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:22:17 pm »
9 miles for skipping an "s" at the end of the last word is not that bad! We live in a place in central France where our third word also ends with an "s" . If you skip that letter, I just checked it out, you end up in Saudi Arabia  :o

That's how it's meant to work. A misheard address should be completely implausible. The decoder offers multiple options and only one of them should make sense if you have even a rough idea where the person is.

The problem is the algorithm offers no guarantee and it's not unusual for misheard pairs to be a couple of miles apart.

I can't seem to find the map that demonstrated loads of such pairs in a rural bit of Scotland. Maybe it's been memory-holed by legal threats.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #121 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:40:41 pm »
We were out walking with some chums, down at Battle, on the 1066 trail, couple of weeks ago, been t'pub, and half way back, came across a couple of lads, (twins) , on their MTB's, who were staying at t'campsite.  any how,  one had gone o'er the top, on a speedy descent (tut tut, t'was a footpath) and was in a bad way.  One had called his father,  who was on his way, lad had concusion,broken wrist, and swollen face, and kept trying to fall asleep. Dad called for medics, and to get his location, we gave the call centre a six figure grid ref off the os map.........silence........wasssat????????,  ain't ya got the ''what free words app?'   .  ?????????????????????
there were 7 adults, and none of us had ever heard of it. Anyway, duly downloaded, in a crap signal area' and the ambulance was waiting on the road,  after we walked him in a dozy state, about 2 miles.

This worries me.  I don't have a smartphone as I have no need for it.  Therefore have no ability to use this app when out and about.  I have looked at the map and explored the few tiles outside our house and front garden, and found a suitably silly one ready for if a takeaway driver requests it.

Some years ago I was riding through that there London and witnessed a pedestrian fall who needed an ambulance.  The 999 operator asked for my location "I'm in London at the junction of Tooley street, Joiner Street,  and I am just outside The London Bridge Experience as well as London Bridge Station."     I'm sure that anybody with London knowledge, or a map, or google, could pinpoint me - prizes will not be awarded for the closest pin on google maps.

The operator had no idea where I was and I had to walk around all the rubberneckers asking them if they had the postcode.  Nobody did as they all just worked there/couldn't be bothered to answer the question.

In the end two uniformed "paramedics" arrived and started treatment, so I ended the call.  It then turned out that they were private first aiders from a nearby building that somebody with more intelligence than myself had gone and summoned in person.   I cycled off sadly shaking my head.

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #122 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:46:38 pm »
I will stick to eastings and northings for the meanwhile.
Get a bicycle. You will never regret it, if you live- Mark Twain

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #123 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:48:52 pm »
The problem is the algorithm offers no guarantee and it's not unusual for misheard pairs to be a couple of miles apart.

Having thought about it for five seconds in the shower, this problem is easily solved by having the app display either an adjacent second w3w address or (shock horror) a fourth word that could be used to confirm the main address.

Or they could just send lawyers after people who suggest it's even a problem.

Davef

Re: what 3 words
« Reply #124 on: 11 May, 2021, 12:55:16 pm »
Of the billions of 3m squares there are a handful with neighbours but a few miles away with similar names.

You would have to be very unlucky to land on one and it be confused with the other.

People seem to be suggesting using 6 figure grid references as a preference. That seems more likely to be error prone due to inexperience or poor comms.

The best thing is to phone from a smartphone with AML/ELS enabled so the location is transmitted when the emergency call is made.