When Technology Needs a Helping Hand
There was a great article on ConsumerReports.org regarding a house in Georgia USA being demolished in error: GPS blamed for home demolition. The gist of the story is that a demolition crew razed the wrong house in error and later “indicated that the GPS coordinates led them to that address and the house matched the description they had”.
This is a classic case of relying too much on technology and not enough on common sense. As others have commented, GPS does have some margin for error (depending on whether they were using differential GPS or not) so you’d think they would have triple-checked before destroying a house.
The main lesson from this sad situation is not having a complete reliance on one source of information (and an arguably inaccurate technology) in cases where there are serious consequences for mistakes. Surely something as simple as a house number or some kind of land plot map would have provided an additional and more accurate checkpoint to help the crew verify their location and - better yet - stop a really bad mistake!
Although this is an extreme case of mistaken location-identity, it is worthwhile considering these possible consequences when using technology in both business and personal situations. The mind boggles how many embarrassing (let alone serious) situations could ensue! Something to watch out for with the proliferation of location-based mobile services …
Published June 14, 2009 . Filed under: Technology
