I had the chance to spend Friday last week in
In searching for the best way to see the city, we discovered an innovative use for GPS technology. Go Cars are 3-wheel modified scooters with a 50cc engine that take you on a guided tour. Your guide is a disembodied but well-mannered woman with a cringingly cheesy sense of humour.
Somebody has put a huge effort into planning a route around the city's sights with multiple optional turns and detours. A complex script has been written for the automated guide, including sufficient coverage for missed turns. A GPS unit hidden somewhere in the car tracks your location and activates pre-recorded messages based on your location. The technology works incredibly well. Because every turn has been pre-planned and, no doubt, rehearsed again and again, the directions given are infinitely better than a "normal" navigation device.
This tour is not for the self-conscious. The cars are bright yellow and noisy; to hear the directions and tour information you have to have the volume turned up quite loud. Just about everybody turns to stare or wave; and we lost count of the number of people of who photographed us. A stack of leaflets are provided so you can promote Go Cars to fellow tourists who stop you to enquire.
We stopped at a café that the car recommended as we drove past. The promise of the best coffee in town and homemade cakes was too much to resist. It wasn't until I was sipping my cappuccino that I realised we had succumbed to Go Car's hidden business model. This is an excellent platform for location based advertising. For now, it is seamless and not at all intrusive, but I imagine a challenge for Go Car as their popularity grows will be balancing commercial pressures against maintaining the honest character of their service.
The whole experience takes a bit of getting used to. It was a good 30 minutes before I can honestly say we were enjoying it; after an hour we were hooked. The GPS-lady seemed happy enough to let us drive way-off route and explore on our own - and she jumped back in at just the right moment when we returned to the beaten-track. Having initially booked 2 hours it was closer to 5 hours by the time we finally returned to base and reluctantly surrendered our cheesy yellow friend.
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