How to avoid speeding tickets? Use Trapster!

Every driver would agree: speeding tickets are a sure way to ruin your day. There is nothing more disheartening than a policeman pulling you over, asking for your license, registration & insurance and asking the standard question: "do you know why I pulled you over?" Trapster is a location-based service that alerts its users about nearby police traps.

March 30, 2008, by itsnearme

Trapster is an online service that sends alerts to users when they are near a police speed trap or red-light camera. The service collects trap information submitted by its users. Registration to the service is simple and trap submissions are anonymous.

There are three ways users can submit traps: Trapster's website, Trapster's GPS-enabled application installed on a Smartphone (currently works with Nokia, RIM, Palm or Windows operating systems) or calling a toll-free number.

Users can receive trap alerts by using the Trapster application installed on their Smartphone which utilizes the mobile phone built in GPS to receive area-relevant alerts, they can subscribe to receive Text or email alerts when a new trap is submitted within a zip code or they can search for traps online in Trapster's website which uses a familiar Google Maps interface.

Trapster is a great idea, but has several problems:
1. The trap information relays on user generated content and in most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute - when we tested our usual 30 mile NY to NJ driving route we found no speed traps even though we know that there are several police hideouts.
2. Quality of submission can be questionable, since anyone can submit a trap it makes the service vulnerable to false reporting by pranksters (or the police), however, this is alleviated by members who can vote and write comments about specific traps. The more “Agree with This Trap” votes a trap receives, the more accurate it is. In addition, members who submitted many high-quality traps receive a Karma rating: the more Karma a user has, the more trustworthy she is.
3. The map interface on Trapster.com has only a location search function by zip code and does not have point-to-point routing capabilities; this makes the service less useful since most driving is done on a route.

While using the service, we were wondering how will Trapster make money? Our initial thoughts were that its user generated content may be worth something to companies such as wireless service providers that could offer location-aware police traps to subscribers or car makers as part of their roadside-protection services (like GM's OnStar).

Trapster should consider raising the quality of data by collecting and auditing it. One way of doing that is to link-up with other services which catalog police trap information like speedtrap.org. If Trapster will overcome this problems, it will provide great value by helping people avoid costly speeding fines and will make drivers drive more carefully!