Just came across this on the news (Babee on board app)

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Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-38690811

A new app launches in the UK on Monday aimed at helping pregnant women get seats on public transport.
Babee on Board consists of two companion apps that communicate via Bluetooth.
Once an alert is triggered, people nearby with the app receive a message saying there is someone who needs to sit down.
The app containing the alert button costs £3.99, which will be donated to a children's charity.
The developers said they were charging a fee to prevent it being used by pranksters.
"We would rather give it away for free but we need to ensure there's a barrier so people don't download it for free and troll those around them," said Hew Leith, chief executive of 10X, the British innovation consultancy behind the app.
"We are donating 100% of the profits to charity."
The partner app which notifies passengers that somebody requires a seat can be downloaded for free and will activate automatically if a seat request is sent.
Click to expand...


Does anyone else think this clearly wasn't very well thought through.

For a start you're relying on the general public to download an app which actually provides no benefit to them.

The next big issue i see is, someone gets on and requests a seat, you then have 20 people jumping up because someone has requested a seat, but without actually knowing who it was that made the request.

I appreciate that the pregnancy badges aren't always visible during busier commutes, but surely they'll have a much better chance of succeeding than this app would.
 
£3.99 to have a bus stand up when you enter like some kind of royalty seems like money well spent :D (before anyone gets the wrong idea I meant people will spend £3.99 to annoy people not that pregnant ladies are somehow expectant of royal treatment).

Does common courtesy really need an app these days? :( Although I guess it would remove the awkward moment of presuming someone is pregnant :D.
 
What a terrible idea. Besides the above issue (general puclic needing the app), when an alert is triggered how do you know who needs the seat? :confused:

If you're on the tube and vacate your seat because of an "alert", it will be filled by the nearest person in approximately 0.4secs regardless of some pregnant woman standing down the carriage.
 
Does this then translate to disabled people? Or those with specific injuries?...

I don't see the point. I'm not going to download an app that serves /no/ function to me... It wouldn't work all the time, either (thinking down on the tubes)...

What happened to old fashioned asking people if they can give up their seat?
 
Why the **** would i clog my phone up with this ****?


I can only assume this was like a college programing peoject?
 
its a worrying sign that in the 21st century we apparently need an app to tell wether or not a woman is pregnant.

god only knows how we did it before grandmaster jobs showed us the way of relying on a mobile phone for everything.
 
adolf hamster said:
its a worrying sign that in the 21st century we apparently need an app to tell wether or not a woman is pregnant.

god only knows how we did it before grandmaster jobs showed us the way of relying on a mobile phone for everything.
Click to expand...

To be fair lots of people make the mistake that somebody is pregnant when it turns out they are just fat nowadays.
 
I won't be installing it. I will use my eyes or if I don't see them, then they can politely ask me to vacate my seat and I will happily stand. However I rarely get a seat nowadays anyway.

On a related vein, why do most women not vacate their seat for someone pregnant?
 
this sort of thing isn't likely to work unless released by a major company with a presence on people's devices already - i.e. a Facebook app or as some sort of alert feature of the android or iOS platforms

even then some of the flaws highlighted above still apply
 
Unless access was given based on the badges being handed out.

Would defeat the prank/lazy people side but still wouldn't get it installed to seat giver phones.
 
Kuros said:
What happened to old fashioned asking people if they can give up their seat?
Click to expand...
What happened to the older-fashioned idea that people would offer first, instead of having to be asked...?

Greebo said:
To be fair lots of people make the mistake that somebody is pregnant when it turns out they are just fat nowadays.
Click to expand...
Yeah, but since only women tend to be pregnant, you can cover that mistake by claiming old-fashioned good manners...
 
ttaskmaster said:
What happened to the older-fashioned idea that people would offer first, instead of having to be asked...?


Yeah, but since only women tend to be pregnant, you can cover that mistake by claiming old-fashioned good manners...
Click to expand...

I think there are several reasons. I'm not saying they are right but just putting them forward as reasons. I was brought up to always offer a pregnant woman a seat and continue to do so:

* Genuinely I can't tell whether some women are fat or pregnant as there are so many overweight people around now. If everyone were to give up their seat to an overweight person then we'd never get a seat ourselves. A badge really helps here.

* Society has become less civil.

* If women don't give up their seat then why should the rest of us? e.g. When I had my broken leg 95% of the seat offers were from men and most women ignored me standing next to them with crutches until I asked.

* Some people have the view that pregnancy is a choice rather than an illness.

* Most people have their eyes on their phone nowadays rather than looking around the carriage. An app may actually help here if everyone installed it.

* A lot of people's journey's are very long now. For example mine can be up to two hours and I stand all the way on most days. When faced with that, you may not give up your seat as you won't get it back again when the pregnant woman gets off perhaps a few stations later (because you usually get shuffled along the carriage as more people get on).

* Women have fought long and hard for equality. They now have it.

As I said, I don't agree with those points but am just putting them here for the sake of examples.
 
>If everyone were to give up their seat to an overweight person then we'd never get a seat ourselves.
Then be a gentleman and give it up for a woman, regardless of her shape. Solved.

>A badge really helps here.
I didn't even know there were badges... are they like the car window ones, then?
Can you get ones with aliens and facehuggers on? :D

>most women ignored me standing next to them with crutches until I asked.
I assume you're male and thus not subject to such courtesies?

>Some people have the view that pregnancy is a choice rather than an illness.
Oftentimes it is... and unfortunately sometimes it is not.

>An app may actually help here if everyone installed it.
Requires installing. Too busy farcebooking. TL:DR, whatever...

>Women have fought long and hard for equality. They now have it.
Not every woman wanted equality forced on them. Some would be perfectly happy to stay home raising the kids and doing the housework. They have the choice to do so, which men also have now, but they don't have to adopt it...

You're damned either way, I guess, so just do whatever feels right.
 
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