What’s finally arriving is the availability of coast-to-coast Internet connectivity through the cell phone providers.  If you’re in Podunk and there’s no major road nearby you may not be within range, but most of us, most of the time, can reach it.

One would expect that the mobile subscriber needs Web pages designed to suit the small-form factor PDA or hand-held computer (240x320, and 640x240 display resolutions, respectively).  These are “no-brainers”, design existing static and dynamic content for small screens.  One collection of public-information agencies; the appraisal districts; should do this right away, so that if I see a house for sale I can find out it’s valuation, square footage, lot size, and present owner before driving off.

There are several further degrees of opportunity.  The mobile Internet makes the Auto PC a practical device.  Most people have no idea what a PC in their car would do, but for starters it could be used to display navigation maps, and tell stories about a region of the country you are driving through for the first time.  What fewer people have thought of is the weather radar.  Most TV stations now have “weather pages”.  If I am driving into a bank of clouds I could find out whether there’s any hail in it.  This could recover the cost of the PC in avoided damage.  This would also be helpful in avoiding construction areas and in locating gas stations and restaurants.

If your teen is disappearing over the weekend with the family car, the Auto PC could make a record of locations, distance traveled, speed, etc.  These boxes are already available, sometimes for as little as $99, but you have to remove them from the car and hook them up to a PC to read back the results.  Would the kid screw with the “nanny”?  Personally, if my kid couldn’t hack the PC in my car, I’d have bigger concerns.

Other rolling stock includes commercial trucks, containers, railroad cars, boats, and aircraft.  Being able to monitor the location and condition of containers might be particularly useful: location, whether it’s open or closed; internal temperature, humidity, and any history of shock or collision.

Once there is a PC in the vehicle, it can be integrated into cameras, voice recorders, and the car’s diagnostic system to interact further with the environment.  The navigation screen normally shows maps, but if the gas is below 1/4th of a tank the gas station symbols start blinking, along with the respective prices for Regular.

Aside from the “blind spot” cameras, the front and back cameras can buffer several seconds of video.  If there is some violent event to the car, such as a collision, these can be written to disk (if the PC is still operational) and duplicated on a remote server.  This could create a “snapshot” of events leading up to a crash, or get the face of someone who smashed your window to steal the car.  If they’re just trying to steal your “radio”, however, the evidence takes off with the loot, unless the GPS is still tracking the perp.

Ultimately, however, this changes how we live, or at least some of us.  With Internet connectivity to one’s person and one’s vehicle, it is possible to act opportunistically in real-time.  One example is the aftermath of a disaster, such as an earthquake or hurricane, and there is a need for volunteers to help clean up and labor for rebuilding houses, utilities, roads, etc.  The “wired citizen” can register with an appropriate site, and people with needs can enter the nature of their requirements, and the computer can find the “best match” not only in terms of skills but also in proximity.  If all the local tile roofers are committed, then those that are in the next “ring” are called up until that resource is exhausted, and so forth.

Far more people can live the life of the “Expeditionary Citizen”.  They might “live” in Duluth, but spend much of their time in campers fishing the area lakes, or in hotels in Louisiana or Florida.  If someone needs a helping hand in the evening shift at the local eatery, they can present their credentials, and if it’s appropriate, they show up at 5:00 to help out.  If someone has a ‘57 Chevy and they would desperately like someone to rebuild their carburetor; hey, I can do that.

Some services are location independent but trust dependent.  I am a programmer writing .NET applications, and my client in San Antonio wants me to fix a problem.  I, however, am on a motorcycle in Alberta.  I have the context of the system in my head, and know right away what it is that needs to be fixed, and I drop in a correction and then resume my trip.

Other services are location dependent but provider independent.  If there is a distressed aircraft on it’s way into an airport in Kansas, whoever has the videotape of the arrival is pure gold to the national media.

Anyone whose tried registering sites with search engines knows it takes awhile for a registration to “take”.  Sometimes it requires multiple submissions over time and takes six weeks for anything to show up after that.  This doesn’t work too well when you’re half-way across the country in six weeks.  So far, I haven’t seen many search engines that understand GPS coordinates for search qualification, in any case.  The amount of work required to get the foundation in place is immense.