Are you one of the few out there who thought Latitude was, like, totally awesome, but your heart lies with the boys at Redmond? Well, rejoice Bing fans, because We’re In is the location-based social network you’ve been waiting for. At its most basic, the app lets you share your location with friends, find contacts on a map, and update your status — great for seeing who is around and organizing outings. But, We’re In has one unique feature that’s actually quite ingenious, location sharing is time limited. You choose who to share GPS data with and for how long. Once the invite expires — poof! No more tracking. A few more details and the download link can be found at the source.

We’re In ushers Bing into the location-based social networking game originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 20 Aug 2011 04:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The “Geolocational Privacy and Surveillance Act” (.pdf) comes amid a hodgepodge of conflicting court rulings (.pdf) about whether such data …

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There are barely any Windows Phone 7 devices running around, so we’re quite happy to see the modified Samsung Omnia surface again, running Windows Phone 7. This latest video walkthrough of the phone (after the jump) shows the phone running the operating system rather smoothly without any sign of lag. All the essential functions are running on this phone, such as GPS, data and also the camera. We’re definitely looking forward to getting our hands on a Windows Phone 7, and hopefully it’ll provide a strong challenge to the iPhone OS and Android OS.

Permalink: Windows Phone 7 Device Gets A Hands On Video from Ubergizmo | Hot: Macbook Pro Review, iPad Review

GPS is such a common feature in mobile phones and gadgets nowadays that we’ve almost come to take the service for granted. We forget that there are 24 busy GPS satellites working to feed us all the location data that we’re requesting. There is some great news, though, as the United States is planning an $8 billion overhaul of the 24 aging satellites. With the new hardware, users will be able to get GPS data that’s accurate to about 3 feets, instead of the current level of accuracy (within 20 feet). Do you already own a device that supports GPS capabilities, or are you in the midst of planning to buy one?

Permalink: GPS Satellites To Get $8bn Overhaul from Ubergizmo | Hot: Macbook Pro Review, iPad Review

At CES we came across quite a few accessories for adding GPS functionality to the iPod Touch and even the first generation iPhone, but they usually consisted of some monstrous sleeve or case that made the device inconvenient to carry around. But PosiMotion has come up with what I think is a better idea. Their G-Fi is basically a battery-powered wireless router with built-in GPS hardware that can stream navigation and position data to your device. It works with both the iPod Touch and iPhone 2G in conjunction with PosiMotion’s Navmii turn-by-turn navigation software ($32.99) and while the mini router can be used to connect any devices that support ad-hoc wifi networks for multiplayer gaming or file transfers, I’m not sure if the streamed GPS data can be used by other applications.

The built-in rechargeable battery powers the G-Fi for about 5 hours with a broadcast range of about 100 feet, and I guess the $99 price tag is a bit cheaper than upgrading to the iPhone 3G or 3GS depending on your current contract. But if you’re trying to choose between the iPod Touch with this and a dedicated GPS device, the latter is probably a cheaper solution. However, if you’re just interested in the mobile wifi router aspect, PosiMotion also sells the G-Fi VS which has a 6 hour battery since it’s not powering GPS chipsets, and a price tag of just $49.99.

[ PosiMotion G-Fi Mobile Network & GPS Router ]

As storm chasing is merely a non-paying hobby for most people involved, I kept thinking that a small handheld GPS system that also pulled radar data would be much less expensive and take up much less space than an entire laptop. And now boom, here it is.

Woot.com is selling the “Bushnell ONIX 400 GPS with XM NEXRAD Weather” for $99.99, today only. It’s got a 3.5-inch 320×200 display, satellite imaging, XM NavWeather (subscription required), 128mb microSD card, 30 hour battery life, and it’s waterproof. Seems like a pretty good addition to just about any storm chaser’s arsenal.

Bushnell ONIX 400 GPS with XM NEXRAD Weather [Woot.com]

My initial take on this story is that we’re dealing with an absurdly inflated number. I doubt in all seriousness that any police department could process even and use a thousand geo location records let along some proportion of eight million. While I don’t doubt our boys in blue are out to help us and catch criminals, there are more pressing budgetary issues in most departments than hiring a data mining expert. That said, this insane number brings up an important question: how much does the government know about us and how much of that data is gathered “to be safe” when it doesn’t need to be gathered.

Our data is, for the most part, free for the taking. I have no expectation of privacy on my phone, email, or web browsing habits. Given enough interest and perhaps cash, anyone can track my every move. This is a given. We cannot change this. That rabbit has left the building, as they say.

What we can change is how much of this surveillance is known to us during or after the fact. The innocent have nothing to hide, obviously, but data dumps, especially for police organizations, rarely stay within the lines. Someone at Sprint, for example, probably saw the subpoena and decided to give up all the goods they had. Database administrators see data as data and it’s as easy to return 10 rows in a database as it is to return all of the rows.

As technologies designed to track us get easier to use, people will use them. My concern is not that they’re watching us but it’s how careless the watchers are in handling the data. This is the real concern.

By Chris Scott Barr

Geotagging is nothing new, and the required hardware is finding itself into more and more cameras. After all, who wouldn’t like to know exactly where their pictures were taken? Well if your camera doesn’t have a built-in GPS device, it’s rather difficult to acquire the exact location of your shot. Thankfully devices such as the JOBO photoGPS exist.

The JOBO photoGPS sits atop your DSLR in the hot-shoe, and captures raw GPS data whenever you snap a photo. Later, when you download your pictures to a computer, you can also download the GPS data. The included software will then use the information it previously gathered and geotag your pictures. It can even add in information such as city, street POIs and more. $159 is a bit pricey, but also looks to be one of the easier geotagging solutions for existing cameras.

[ JOBO ] VIA [ GizMag ]

Here’s a big, fat GPS-enabled wristwatch that’ll allow you to walk around and then see where you walked around on Google Maps. You can also use it to find your way back to a certain location and even geo-tag photos to boot. There’s 8 megabytes of built-in storage to log all of your nefarious movements.

What’s also nice, if I may opine for a minute, is that if you hook this watch up to your computer via the USB cable, you can use it as an actual GPS receiver (XP and Vista only, apparently). So load up some sort of netbook or MID inside your car and then plug your watch into it for some nice Google Maps action.

Battery life is good for just 21 hours so if you’re not used to charging your timepiece every day, you’ll have to make it part of your daily routine. Maybe put “charge watch” somewhere in between “brush teeth,” “watch Golden Girls,” and “have a nice, long cry” if possible.

The GPS Watch costs $77.61 and is available from Chinavasion.

GPS Watch (Location Finder + Data Logger + Photo Tagger) [Chinavasion.com]