Althouse: "The app even warned Woolley not to fall asleep if he felt he was going into shock..."

January 21, 2010

"The app even warned Woolley not to fall asleep if he felt he was going into shock..."

"... so he set his cellphone’s alarm clock to go off every 20 minutes."

7 comments:

AllenS said...: A rapid loss of blood results in a feeling of a need to fall asleep. To avoid shock, you have to keep moving. Been there, done that.; 1/21/10, 7:09 AM
rhhardin said...: I learned in 5th grade that the Indians used to drive nails into the earth to prevent earthquakes.

Just mentioning that makes the information available to future earthquake victims.; 1/21/10, 8:38 AM
Tibore said...: If this guy's smart, he'll hire an agent to contact Apple's marketing department ASAP.

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As a side note: I've never thought about a smartphone-type PDA as a survival aid. But onboard cameras plus storage, plus potential communications (providing that the cell infrastructure is intact, which would not have been the case in Haiti, but could be the case in an event like 9/11) all adds up to a small but oddly useful tool. Sure, it won't get a person out of his predicament (unless he can make a phone call out), but it can accomplish what it did in Woolley's case.

Huh... part of my job is to support these devices. Wonder if I'll be getting email about this now. :D; 1/21/10, 8:47 AM
Leland said...: The comments on the article are interesting. Agree with RyanM. I don't know about 65 hours, but my iPhone batter has lasted well into a third day. You don't need full brightness in pitch black darkness. And once you realize the cellular system is down, putting the phone into airplane mode extends the battery life.

Neither the Wired article or MSNBC article really explain the entire situation. We don't know when the app was downloaded, before or after the earthquake. Therefore, we don't know what connectivity he had. He wrote notes on paper, so apparently he wasn't texting his wife, yet he desperately wanted her to know his ordeal.; 1/21/10, 8:47 AM
rhhardin said...: I think somebody made a book out of things Japanese passengers wrote while they cruised around in a doomed rudderless 747 in the 80s that eventually crashed into a mountain.

I remember the response that the pilot coined after trying various radioed suggestions from Boeing, "Uncontrol."; 1/21/10, 9:00 AM
Anonymous said...: Is there anything the iPhone does not do???

I guess this does refute all the charges of battery problems.; 1/21/10, 10:23 AM
Leland said...: Is there anything the iPhone does not do???

Does this answer your question:

An iPhone application to translate a baby's cries and tell parents instantly what they mean has been made available.; 1/21/10, 10:26 AM