Online magazine creates app that shames illegal car parkers
Russian online magazine The-Village.ru has created an application for mobile phones that it hopes will name and shame motorists who park their cars illegally, like on sidewalks or pedestrian lanes.
The app is known as Parking Douche, and it reportedly works after you take a picture of an illegally parked vehicle by recognizing its license plate, model and color. The data gathered by the app is then streamed live to banner ads that are supposedly targeted through an IP address. What this does, then, is that the people who live or work near the location where the offending car is parked know where it is through the banner ads that appear as pop-ups on a website. In a way, the car annoys you virtually just like how it annoys motorists and pedestrians in reality. To get rid of the pop-up ad, you only need to share the photo of the offending vehicle that's generated by the pop-up ad on social media sites like Facebook.
According to the video, thanks to the use of the IP address, "only douches in your area will be highlighted so all the offenders will be exposed to their colleagues, friends and neighbors."
It certainly sounds like a good idea and takes online vigilantism to the next level. What do you think? Would a similar, locally tailored app work here to shame the able-bodied people who park, for instance, in slots especially reserved for the handicapped?
If you're viewing this on a mobile device and can't see the video, please click here.
