"Carmageddon", the clever name for a 53-hour shutdown of 10 miles of Los Angeles' 405 Freeway, has splashed its' way into countless publications as of late. The impending chaos, due to infuriate drivers from 10 p.m. Friday, July 15th to 5 a.m. Monday, July 18th has invoked a sizable national debate: namely, just what in the hell does the L.A. DOT think it's doing? 53 hours to rebuild a ten-mile stretch of the most-travelled highway in US history? Seriously?
Many Angelenos will likely spend the better part of their day, or weekend for the thoroughly unlucky, laying on horns, exercising particular fingers and otherwise partaking in a 200,000-part harmony of rage. But while those partaking in Carmageddon will be shaking their fists, an ambitious-to-a-fault cluster of businesses and entrepreneurs will be licking their chops. (Other groups soon to be licking their chops, of course, include zombies and vampires, for whom this whole Carmageddon thing will be like catching fish in a 10-mile long barrel.)
A plethora of products, sales and strategies will be deployed during, and specifically for, the days of fury. $5 Irish Car Bombs, right-off-the-highway hotel room specials and T-Shirts bearing captions such as "The price you pay to live in L.A." are all fantastic ideas, though the $5 drink deals do present a possibility for one or several "Carmastrophes" (See what I did there?). Additionally Waze, the Israeli-made GPS app that feeds smartphones constant updates to live traffic conditions, has guaranteed it's ability to "beat Carmageddon". The rub is that the vast majority of entrenched Angelenos on the 405 must be simultaneously running the application for it to successfully determine the conditions in real time.
The marketing strategy of Waze has potential, but it may be derailed by another smartphone-targeted strategy. In fact, AT&T's plan to bombard those of their customers who are unfortunate enough to be playing bumper cars on the 405 will very likely force many smartphone owners to do the precise opposite of what Waze is encouraging: Turn off their phones.
Aside from the Los Angeles Department of Transportation installing Lady Gage-blaring speakers along the entire 10-mile stretch of highway in question, I can think of nothing that would be a more infuriating complement to a 40 mile traffic jam than my phone company seizing the opportunity to text me a steady stream of plugs for their own navigation app. Not only would I be driven to the edge by the sheer lunacy of sending endorsements for a GPS program to someone stuck in 40 miles of bumper-to-bumper traffic, I would likely be forced over the aforementioned edge by the continual interruptions to the surely epic game of Wordmole I would have going.
Does nobody else see this as a major invasion of privacy? The issues I see are not confined to the text messages themselves, though that part of it does indeed fall into an ethical grey area; The receipt of text messages encouraging me to activate programs being sold by the company to whom I am already paying for very specific services is surely some form of harassment, however minor the inconvenience may be.
Operating with a limited knowledge of the procedural functions of a cell phone, I am not particularly perturbed by the fact that my phone company knows where I am at all times, as (I think) that is necessary in order for me to make and receive calls. It's the manipulation of that fact that would bother me. I use my phone's GPS all the time, but my phone's GPS using me seems like a clear intrusion into my personal bubble. It may just be the deep-seated fear of machines controlling my life talking here (for which I can thank a childhood viewing of Terminator), but this whole mess has me becoming borderline terrified of my phone.
I'll be 3,000 miles from the raging chaos of Carmageddon, but I think I may just take the SIM card out of my phone for the weekend.
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