device to track missing people
tonya wright
I had heard of this before but didn't know any details. I found this
article today. While it is definately worth any price compared to a missing
child it sounded expensive to me. Maybe once it has been around longer it
will get more affordable. $300 per child + a monthly subscription fee which
they didn't say how much it would be, YIKES!
Tonya
Brittany & Melody's Mommy
4/22/99 12/01/01
A Device to Track Missing People
By SABRA CHARTRAND
When Samantha Runion, Danielle van Dam and Elizabeth Short were snatched
from their homes, parents everywhere shared the dread and sense of
helplessness of the girls' families. How do you find a child who has simply
vanished at the hands of a stranger?
It is at times impossible. But technology does exist that can pinpoint a
person's location using orbiting satellites. Now an inventor who originally
wanted to tap the global positioning satellite system to find her runaway
dog has won several patents for applying her idea to following and finding
people.
Jennifer Durst, a single mother from Oyster Bay, N.Y., and two partners have
patented a lightweight, portable G.P.S. transceiver that she says is
designed to be "form-fitted into a backpack, a baseball hat or a belt," for
example. Ms. Durst, Eugene Fowler and Joseph McAlexander have received one
patent for a "pet locator" and two more for a "mobile object locator" that
can be used to track animals or people. The Patent and Trademark Office has
notified them that their fourth patent has been approved, although it has
not been issued yet.
Their devices can be programmed with boundaries, and if those boundaries are
exceeded, the devices send messages directly to a cellphone, pager, two-way
personal assistant, traditional phone or even an e-mail address. Those
messages are followed by continuously updated geographic information, she
said.
"Up until now, a G.P.S. device could tell you where you are," Ms. Durst
explained last week, just days after her latest patent was issued. "But it
doesn't tell me where you are. What I've done is make it, `Now tell me
directly where you are.' "
"I hope we don't get to the point where our kids have to sleep in their own
homes with this," she added. "I'm sorry about the negative association that
comes with the news of these poor abducted children. I had hoped this would
be a warm, fuzzy application, a way for parents to feel better at an
amusement park."
Nevertheless, she said she could envision it being used several ways � "if
my daughter was playing on her bike in front of the house or out in the
yard."
A parent would program the perimeter of the yard or neighborhood into Ms.
Durst's gadget. Those coordinates could be changed or updated at any time.
If the child went for a walk with a parent, the adult could use a password
to suspend the boundaries.
When the person wearing the gadget leaves the specified perimeter, an alert
is sent to a designated two-way radio device. Location information follows
in the form of text, figures, graphics or numbers, and is updated every few
seconds, in effect following a person down a street, through a neighborhood
or around an amusement park.
"It could say, `Elvis has left the building,' " Ms. Durst explained, "and
would update the location until the pet or person is recovered."
If the tracking system is removed for any reason, an alert and last known
location are transmitted. Ms. Durst said she also designed a model that
incorporates a "panic button" so someone in distress can send their own
alarm about their location.
Ms. Durst said she designed the system to notify the person back at the home
base directly. Other G.P.S. systems send data to a central computer.
"I don't want to have to contact a call center," she explained. "I don't
want to wait online to find out where my kid is."
The device weighs about seven ounces, though Ms. Durst said she hoped it
would become smaller as the technology advanced. It runs on a rechargeable
battery and picks up its G.P.S. signals with a flat, patchlike antenna.
Even though abductions by strangers � like those of the Runion, Van Damm and
Short girls � are rare, countless children are temporarily lost every year
in crowded amusement parks, at the beach and in shopping malls. Adults are
also often lost in a variety of ways, too: Alzheimer's patients sometimes
wander off, hikers and mountain climbers disappear in the wilderness,
soldiers go missing in action. Ms. Durst says any of these people could be
tracked with precision if only they were linked to the G.P.S. system.
But the idea actually started with her dog.
"About three years ago, I was searching for my lost dog in the pouring
rain," she recalled. "I'm a divorced mom with two kids at home, and I had an
invisible fence, but my dog would just break through it. I had the choice of
once again piling the kids in the car at night to look for the dog, or
leaving the kids at home alone.
"Needless to say, I put the kids in the car and drove around in the rain,
with everyone crying over the dog," she said. Her search made her think
about the tracking system called LoJack that many people install in their
cars. "I thought, there's LoJack for cars, so we should have LoDog,"
recalled Ms. Durst, who did not find the dog until the next day.
With two partners, Ms. Durst began work on a pet locator, a lightweight and
programmable receiver-transmitter that used the G.P.S. and could be embedded
in a dog's collar.
"After the initial application for the pet locator, the other applications
became obvious," Ms. Durst said.
She and her partners have several prototypes, including one that is part of
a child's fanny pack and could be rented to parents at amusement parks like
Disney World, and one for the military that she said "will send the location
of a soldier directly to a platoon leader or to each other."
She hopes that at the very least, her invention will mean "you'll never see
those `Lost Dog' signs again."
The system for tracking children or adults is not available for sale yet,
even though Ms. Durst and her partners have a Web site at www.gpstracks.com
that offers information about the dog-finding collar. Ms. Durst estimated
the system would cost about $300, plus a monthly subscription fee. She and
her fellow inventors, Eugene Fowler and Joseph McAlexander, have won three
patents: the pet locator is 6, 172, 640, and the "mobile object locator"
received 6,236,358 and 6,421,001.
The secret to life isn't getting what you want it's wanting it once you get
it-Katherine Hepburn in "Love Affair"
Remember starting the fire is easy, the hardest part is learning how to keep
the flame-Stevie Nicks "Love's A Hard Game To Play" Timespace
_________________________________________________________________
Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com
article today. While it is definately worth any price compared to a missing
child it sounded expensive to me. Maybe once it has been around longer it
will get more affordable. $300 per child + a monthly subscription fee which
they didn't say how much it would be, YIKES!
Tonya
Brittany & Melody's Mommy
4/22/99 12/01/01
A Device to Track Missing People
By SABRA CHARTRAND
When Samantha Runion, Danielle van Dam and Elizabeth Short were snatched
from their homes, parents everywhere shared the dread and sense of
helplessness of the girls' families. How do you find a child who has simply
vanished at the hands of a stranger?
It is at times impossible. But technology does exist that can pinpoint a
person's location using orbiting satellites. Now an inventor who originally
wanted to tap the global positioning satellite system to find her runaway
dog has won several patents for applying her idea to following and finding
people.
Jennifer Durst, a single mother from Oyster Bay, N.Y., and two partners have
patented a lightweight, portable G.P.S. transceiver that she says is
designed to be "form-fitted into a backpack, a baseball hat or a belt," for
example. Ms. Durst, Eugene Fowler and Joseph McAlexander have received one
patent for a "pet locator" and two more for a "mobile object locator" that
can be used to track animals or people. The Patent and Trademark Office has
notified them that their fourth patent has been approved, although it has
not been issued yet.
Their devices can be programmed with boundaries, and if those boundaries are
exceeded, the devices send messages directly to a cellphone, pager, two-way
personal assistant, traditional phone or even an e-mail address. Those
messages are followed by continuously updated geographic information, she
said.
"Up until now, a G.P.S. device could tell you where you are," Ms. Durst
explained last week, just days after her latest patent was issued. "But it
doesn't tell me where you are. What I've done is make it, `Now tell me
directly where you are.' "
"I hope we don't get to the point where our kids have to sleep in their own
homes with this," she added. "I'm sorry about the negative association that
comes with the news of these poor abducted children. I had hoped this would
be a warm, fuzzy application, a way for parents to feel better at an
amusement park."
Nevertheless, she said she could envision it being used several ways � "if
my daughter was playing on her bike in front of the house or out in the
yard."
A parent would program the perimeter of the yard or neighborhood into Ms.
Durst's gadget. Those coordinates could be changed or updated at any time.
If the child went for a walk with a parent, the adult could use a password
to suspend the boundaries.
When the person wearing the gadget leaves the specified perimeter, an alert
is sent to a designated two-way radio device. Location information follows
in the form of text, figures, graphics or numbers, and is updated every few
seconds, in effect following a person down a street, through a neighborhood
or around an amusement park.
"It could say, `Elvis has left the building,' " Ms. Durst explained, "and
would update the location until the pet or person is recovered."
If the tracking system is removed for any reason, an alert and last known
location are transmitted. Ms. Durst said she also designed a model that
incorporates a "panic button" so someone in distress can send their own
alarm about their location.
Ms. Durst said she designed the system to notify the person back at the home
base directly. Other G.P.S. systems send data to a central computer.
"I don't want to have to contact a call center," she explained. "I don't
want to wait online to find out where my kid is."
The device weighs about seven ounces, though Ms. Durst said she hoped it
would become smaller as the technology advanced. It runs on a rechargeable
battery and picks up its G.P.S. signals with a flat, patchlike antenna.
Even though abductions by strangers � like those of the Runion, Van Damm and
Short girls � are rare, countless children are temporarily lost every year
in crowded amusement parks, at the beach and in shopping malls. Adults are
also often lost in a variety of ways, too: Alzheimer's patients sometimes
wander off, hikers and mountain climbers disappear in the wilderness,
soldiers go missing in action. Ms. Durst says any of these people could be
tracked with precision if only they were linked to the G.P.S. system.
But the idea actually started with her dog.
"About three years ago, I was searching for my lost dog in the pouring
rain," she recalled. "I'm a divorced mom with two kids at home, and I had an
invisible fence, but my dog would just break through it. I had the choice of
once again piling the kids in the car at night to look for the dog, or
leaving the kids at home alone.
"Needless to say, I put the kids in the car and drove around in the rain,
with everyone crying over the dog," she said. Her search made her think
about the tracking system called LoJack that many people install in their
cars. "I thought, there's LoJack for cars, so we should have LoDog,"
recalled Ms. Durst, who did not find the dog until the next day.
With two partners, Ms. Durst began work on a pet locator, a lightweight and
programmable receiver-transmitter that used the G.P.S. and could be embedded
in a dog's collar.
"After the initial application for the pet locator, the other applications
became obvious," Ms. Durst said.
She and her partners have several prototypes, including one that is part of
a child's fanny pack and could be rented to parents at amusement parks like
Disney World, and one for the military that she said "will send the location
of a soldier directly to a platoon leader or to each other."
She hopes that at the very least, her invention will mean "you'll never see
those `Lost Dog' signs again."
The system for tracking children or adults is not available for sale yet,
even though Ms. Durst and her partners have a Web site at www.gpstracks.com
that offers information about the dog-finding collar. Ms. Durst estimated
the system would cost about $300, plus a monthly subscription fee. She and
her fellow inventors, Eugene Fowler and Joseph McAlexander, have won three
patents: the pet locator is 6, 172, 640, and the "mobile object locator"
received 6,236,358 and 6,421,001.
The secret to life isn't getting what you want it's wanting it once you get
it-Katherine Hepburn in "Love Affair"
Remember starting the fire is easy, the hardest part is learning how to keep
the flame-Stevie Nicks "Love's A Hard Game To Play" Timespace
_________________________________________________________________
Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com