My iPhone 4 Tracking Data

Before any “[bad actors](http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2011/04/senator-questions-apple-in-wake-of-ios-tracking-scandal.ars)” make off with my [iPhone tracking data](http://petewarden.github.com/iPhoneTracker/) (is Hollywood really running out of ideas that badly?), I figured I’d have a look at some of the tracking data my iPhone collected over the past year:

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 08 06 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.08.06-AM.png)

In San Jose for Delphi Live 2010, including a couple trips up to San Francisco, and a lengthy photo shoot drive down south towards Hearst Castle with my colleague Sebastian, our friend Jeroen and his wife. Several erratic false locations placing us further east that we ever where.

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 09 05 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.09.05-AM.png)

Austin, Texas for [360iDev](http://www.360idev.com) (which was great, and I’m looking forward to this year’s, in Colorado). The location info seems rather sparse and grid-like. I’m not *too* worried they’re gonna use that to place me on that crime scene…

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 09 54 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.09.54-AM.png)

Las Vegas for our first [DSConf](http://www.dsconf.com). One does not get around that much in Las Vegas; in fact i don’t think i managed to even get outside the MGM Grand or see sunlight for the 3 core days of conference. Once again, the location info looks sparse and grid-like, close-up.

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 11 06 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.11.06-AM.png)

My travels thru europe to see the [Sisters](http://www.thesistersofmercy.com) live this spring. You can see the train ride from Berlin to Dortmund, the drive from London to Leeds, and stops in Tilburg, NL and Brussels. I’m surprised those drives look so sparse; it’s as if the iPhone tracks less when it doesn’t a have 3G data connection. Weird. You can also see a stopover in Frankfurt/Main, from the trip to San Jose.

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 12 10 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.12.10-AM.png)

Finally, a semi-closeup of Berlin. Once again, the tracking data is all over the place and fairly useless, I’d say. I’ve certainly never been to Hohenschönhausen ;).

So the morale: don’t rely on this iPhone feature for geotagging your photos…

**Update**: Looks like the grid-ification is a feature of the sample app, the actual location data collected is not on that grid. A simple one-line change in the app reveals the real data – which still is all over the place and, I dare say, just useless and unconcerning:

![Screen shot 2011 04 21 at 11 49 03 AM](http://blogs.remobjects.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Screen-shot-2011-04-21-at-11.49.03-AM.png)

This above is Berlin, without the grid. And no, I don’t get around that much ;). If anything, I’d say the gridded data looks cooler.