Thursday, March 13, 2014

Yep, There's An APP For That: Where To Go, When You HAVE TO GO!

Thoughtful Thursday KNOWSY Readers, and with so many breaking news stories on different fronts it is difficult to choose which one to highlight. The question of where the Malaysian airplane has disappered to, the gas explosion in New York City, or the drunk driver who plowed through pedestrians at the SXSW Festival. To the families of those killed you have my deepest sympathy, and to everyone else, please remember, DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE!
Sadly, there is no right way to segue into my post today, I debated about posting it, however, the fact of the matter is that for anyone travelling: families with children, business men and women, students and everyone in between this is not a laughing matter. This is part of our daily lives and as such you always want to hve the best and most accurate information at your disposal. So without any further ado, this article was featured in fastcoexist.com and was written by Ben Schiller.


Need To Find A Bathroom? The Sharing Economy Has Got You Covered

Though it started off a half-joke, people are almost peeing themselves with excitement over Airpnp--a service that lets people in need of relief find a nearby bathroom for hire.

Max Gaudin came up with the idea for Airpnp--basically Airbnb for toilets--during last year's Mardi Gras festival, in New Orleans. But he didn't start building the app until very recently. And, even then, it was more in the sense of "to hell with it, let's put something up" than a calculated roll-out.

Since then, Airpnp has shall we say exploded. Gaudin did an interview recently with Canada's leading TV network (while sitting on his toilet). His partner Travis Laurendine has been recognized by the White House (for "civic hacking"). And there are now plenty of listings beyond Lake Pontchartrain, with more than 300 toilets in all. Should you find yourself short a toilet in Tehran, for example, you know where to go ("come and Pee! Western style toilet with toilet papers!").





















"People are tweeting and adding restrooms in languages we don't understand. The French really seem to dig it," Gaudin says (there are eight listings in Paris already). "We are constantly getting feature requests from people. A couple of them have been to note places that are LGBT friendly and available for baby changing."




As with Airbnb, people set a listing, preferably with a photo, and charge a fee--usually something in the dollar-per-visit range. There are now offerings for hi-tech toilets in Japan, as well as for foul places that might be best avoided. Some people charge nothing, others want a pretty penny. One listing is priced at $6 for 15 minutes, with another $8 for every five minutes on top of that, which seems like a lot.
Gaudin says he's working on something for the South by Southwest festival, another packed urban setting with limited pee-stops. The founders may add advertising to make back some money. Or not. Everything's up in the air at the moment, which is how things have been since the beginning.






Alright my KNOWSY Readers, remember the "facilities" you will be locating are Private not Public, which is to say you have to pay a fee to use them. For some of you that may be an issue, yet for others it will be money well spent when other facilities are no where to be found or simply too far away when Nature Calls!

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