3 words addresses

what3words.com

2 points·zakki··5 comments

I submitted it out of my curiosity. I posted here, usually HNers have more information than my own searching. In their mobile app I searched a place and then copy the words. Then I searched the 3 words location and it shows 3 differen locations. Anybody knows why? The word is ounce.assumes.grafted. The location matched the word is near Surabaya, Indonesia then near Chibougamau, Quebec and near saguache, Colorado.

Editing: autocorrect gone crazy

Same thing for my current location.

"We have divided the world into a grid of 3m x 3m squares and assigned each one a unique 3 word address."

"Unique" - You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means...

I think if you look closely you will find some of those alternatives are plurals, just in case you made a mistake. "To avoid confusion, similar sounding addresses are also placed as far from each other as possible. The app will account for spelling errors and other typing mistakes and make suggestions, based on 3 word addresses nearby."

Yes, you’re right. I checked my screenshot. It is different. For non English speakers it is not quiet good.

Yeah I can see how that would be a bit confusing.

I guess if you were using it in the real world you would hopefully have an idea of where in the world your target was and if your phone autocorrected to a plural you should still get there.

I would assume the option to show variations could be turned off when using the apis so it would depend on the use case as to whether this behaviour was desired or not and then utilised.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com