[whicks]

As a technologist, this is an incredible development.

As a backpacker and avid hiker, no thank you. I go outside to intentionally avoid screens and the internet/connected world. Fortunately I can just not buy this and it won’t have an impact on my life.

Another interesting thing I’m curious about is if this would provide any benefits to SAR crews over traditional sat phones. I could potentially see some benefits there, maybe, but I guess time will tell.

[lxgr]

> I’m curious about is if this would provide any benefits to SAR crews over traditional sat phones.

For their communications, I doubt it, unless they happen to need low-latency video (e.g. for telemedicine for complicated cases). Existing solutions are pretty robust, and for anything you use on the move you probably want an omnidirectional antenna you don't have to rest on some surface in operation.

I could imagine this being interesting for drone-based/agumented missing person search, though!

> Fortunately I can just not buy this and it won’t have an impact on my life.

Thank you for saying this. So many people have a knee-jerk reaction of "this will ruin the outdoors" or "this means I can never disconnect anymore", which both kind of imply a concerning lack of agency. The outdoors are large enough for everybody, and nobody can force you to buy and bring one of these things!

[bee_rider]

It could make it easier to stream music, I’ve come across people who play music on Bluetooth speakers during their hikes. It is really weird behavior that spoils the area around them. Then again, they could just download the music if they are really that devoted to being a nuisance.

[snapplebobapple]

My first thought was "by backpacker they must mean the rucksack and machine gun variety protecting ukraine because not many backpackers want technology intruding on their expedition"