Technology: August 2006 Archives

Stockholm recently concluded a wonderful experiment in reducing traffic congestion. From January 1 to July 31, they turned on a variable cost toll system which charged 3 different toll levels, peaking twice a day at rush hour. From 6:30pm to 6:30am the roads remained completely free. All this was done using simple metal arches over the roads—no stopping for a toll booth. If you had a transponder box the funds would be deducted from your bank account; if you didn't, you'd receive a bill based on your license plate that could be taken care of at convenience stores.

Guess what? People changed their work schedules. They used buses and bikes more. Those with environmentally friendly cars could chortle a little more since they got a free ride. Travel times dropped by 1/3 at peak hours. Pollution was reduced. Even accident rates went down.

And why did it end July 31st? Because this was a trial period for a plan which was an unpopular initiative. The public vote to make it a permanent system is September 17, with every traffic planner in the world watching closely. While public support is greatly increased (and traffic right back up at December levels with the tolls off), politics are never certain.

Further reading:

• Official Stockholm Trials Web site
• World Changing, a Stockholm-based environmental blog
• Wall Street Journal article (subscription required)

I love it when technology is used to reinforce human behavior instead of to try and force people into a computer's mold. I could live with a toll system like this on 520 or I-90.

Recently AOL had a little "oops." They released 3 months' search data for over 650,000 subscribers. While they removed the AOL account names, they replaced those individual IDs with equally unique numeric IDs. Between "ego surfing" for one's own name and other specific local searches over such an extensive period, many of the "anonymous" people in this file could be identified. Theoretically this was supposed to be just for researchers, but they put it up on an unprotected site and naturally a whole bunch of other people found this Web goldmine. While they've apologized, there's no way to stuff the data back in the box.

Why do people care about the file? Several reasons. Search engine optimization consultants are drooling over the opportunity to compare search queries with the pages people clicked on. Since Google drives AOL's searches, their competitors now have a handy volume of data for reverse engineering their algorithms. Law enforcement has enough searches on illegal topics to keep them occupied for ages. The rest of us can simply be seduced by the life dramas captured in a season's worth of surfing.

Why should we all care about the release? If you didn't understand Google's resistance to disclosing this kind of data, maybe you can now see how personal it really is. Compared to regions such as the EU, the US already has very weak and patchwork privacy laws. And yet, it seems each week there's another attempt to erode them a little more. For some reason Minority Report is coming to mind, when Anderton (Cruise) was walking through the shopping center and every billboard tracked him as he walked by. If you think it's just SciFi, you haven't been paying attention to RFID developments.