Smartphone addicts get street warning signs in South Korea

Smartphones can be dangerous. Not because they may potentially cause cancer (that's a valid concern), but because people are so glued to them and often not looking at what they're walking into on the street.

With the help of the National Police Agency, Seoul, South Korea's Metropolitan Government is taking preventive measures to warn the city's citizens to be more aware of their surroundings when using their smartphones.

The Seoul government unveiled two traffic signs as a part of a pilot program, which you can see below. One sign, "Warning: Using Smartphone while Walking," is for warning pedestrians about the dangers of getting hit by a car while using a smartphone while crossing the street.

Another sign, "Walk Safely," is designed to discourage users from getting lost in their phones while walking on the sidewalk.

IMAGE: SEOUL METROPOLITAN GOVERNMENT

The new traffic signs will be installed in five districts (Hongdae, City Hall, Yonsei University, Gangnam Station and Jamsil Station) the government has identified as areas that have seen high reports of smartphone-related accidents from citizens in their 10s to 30s.

It's also not the first time we've seen smartphone-specific solutions implemented by cities. A few years back, a Chinese theme park in Chongqing, China, came up with aclever walking lane designed just for people using their smartphones. 

While it was only isolated to the theme park and a similar texting lane was installed in Washington D.C. as part of the "Mind Over Masses" science series campaign for National Geographic, these solutions shouldn't be shrugged off as silly.

The fact is, many of us are head-down, glued to our smartphones, completely unaware of the dangers around us. It wouldn't surprise me if in addition to increased traffic accidents, pick-pocketers are nabbing huge hauls simply because people aren't paying attention to their belongings and surroundings.

The concerted effort to better inform Seoul's smartphone-addicted citizens is admirable, but it's questionable if the signs will make much of a difference. We won't know until after the signs have been installed whether or not smartphone-related accidents decrease in the city.

In Europe, Ford will read the speed limit signs, prevent your speeding

Good news for those of us with a fast car, a lead foot and poor impulse control: Ford is rolling out a new Speed Limiter feature. The car uses a camera to read the speed limit signs before giving you a heads up if your velocity is making you a police-magnet.

For now, the technology is only being rolled out on the company’s European line of cars, including the Edge, Galaxy and S-MAX vehicles. The Euro-market is a particularly good match for the technology, given that there are more than 35,000 speed cameras across Europe, and speeding tickets turning up in the mail is practically a national sport across much of the continent. Smile for the camera, indeed.

It’s yet another tiny piece of the self-driving car puzzle falling into place. In this case, in a car with the Intelligent Speed Limiter activated, a camera will read traffic signs ahead, adjusting the car’s speed without the driver needing to get involved. If the car you’re driving has a navigation package, it will augment the camera data with the speed limit data from the maps. Clever.

In effect, the speed nanny combines two technologies into the new, wallet-saving feature. The first is an adjustable speed limiter, which is a bit like cruise control, but instead of keeping your car at a fixed speed, it lets you drive normally but prevents you from going faster than your set speed limit. The second — and, frankly, more interesting — technology is traffic sign recognition, which shows you right on your dashboard the most recent passing restrictions, speed limit signs and other information.

You can see the technology in action in the video below