possibly noteworthy wrote:
This seems like something we've talked about before.

Citysense was built to show you where the action is, right now.

When the Mission or Soma is busier than normal – you'll know immediately.

Citysense is an application that operates on the Sense Networks Macrosense platform, which analyzes massive amounts of aggregate, anonymous location data in real-time. Macrosense is already being used by business people for things like selecting store locations and understanding retail demand. But we asked ourselves: with all this real-time data, what else could we do for a city? Nightlife enhancement was the obvious answer. This release is just a test, and we're interested in your feedback on how to make the application better. You'll find a feedback button in Citysense.

Whats the data source?

Citysense was built to show you where the action is, right now.

Decius asked:

What's the data source?

According to the web site:

At the heart of Macrosense are powerful machine learning algorithms that process time-stamped location data and metadata streams from heterogeneous sources – GPS, WiFi positioning, cell tower triangulation, RFID and other sensors – and empower companies and investors to better understand and predict human behavior on a macro scale.

We're on the path to precrime!

They promise to answer some interesting questions:

How many people are going out at night? Locally or to destinations? By income level? Did the financial district come in early this morning?

From where do the most people come from before arriving at a particular location? Where do most people go afterwards, and how does this change throughout the day?

I'll ask the follow-up question: Who is behind this?

It's MIT professor Sandy Pentland, of Reality Mining fame.

possibly noteworthy wrote:

Citysense was built to show you where the action is, right now.

Decius asked:

What's the data source?

According to the web site:

At the heart of Macrosense are powerful machine learning algorithms that process time-stamped location data and metadata streams from heterogeneous sources – GPS, WiFi positioning, cell tower triangulation, RFID and other sensors – and empower companies and investors to better understand and predict human behavior on a macro scale.

We're on the path to precrime!

They promise to answer some interesting questions:

How many people are going out at night? Locally or to destinations? By income level? Did the financial district come in early this morning?

From where do the most people come from before arriving at a particular location? Where do most people go afterwards, and how does this change throughout the day?

I'll ask the follow-up question: Who is behind this?

It's MIT professor Sandy Pentland, of Reality Mining fame.

Unless there is some detail that I'm missing, this sounds positively orwellian.

Decius wrote:

Unless there is some detail that I'm missing, this sounds positively orwellian.

According to Sense Networks, all the location data that it gathers from mobile phones, GPS and Wi-Fi is completely anonymous so privacy should not be an issue.

It's not an issue, okay?!?

See also, from recent NYT:

Sense’s models were developed initially from sources like taxicab companies that let it look at location data over such a period. Sense also uses publicly available data, like weather information, and other nonpublic sources that it would not disclose.

Reality mining raises instant questions about privacy, especially when cellphone data is involved. In the United States, it is illegal in many cases for cellphone companies to share customers’ location data without their consent.

Mr. Skibiski says that Sense is interested only in aggregate data and that it’s looking for broad patterns, not the specific behavior of individuals. But he recognizes the privacy issue.

possibly noteworthy wrote:
Decius wrote:

Unless there is some detail that I'm missing, this sounds positively orwellian.

According to Sense Networks, all the location data that it gathers from mobile phones, GPS and Wi-Fi is completely anonymous so privacy should not be an issue.

It's not an issue, okay?!?

If they have this data, so do others, and in the case of law enforcement, no warrant is required.