Tips for heater safety from New York Fire Department’s bravest

In New York City subways this January advertising cards above the seats include a picture of a city fire fighter who is offering safety tips for using portable heaters. He urges riders to go to heatersafety.org for STAY SAFE: TOP TIPS FOR USING YOUR ELECTRIC HEATER SAFELY. The website, in both English and Espanol, offers 12 illustrated tips online and a free brochure to order by email. There is also an audio message that plays when you click here. The audio features one of New York’s bravest: FDNY Lt. Anthony Mancuso discussing portable heater safety. The STAY SAFE website and brochures offer materials and advice from experts. The materials are free and can be used by parents and teachers to inform children about the dangers of portable heaters, helping to keep them safe. The project is sponsored by the Association of Home appliance manufacturers.

Mobile phones are becoming Internet browsers

The picture above is part of the wrapper from a cup of coffee bought by a blogger writing in Las Vegas. He uses it to illustrate a post on Mobhappy.com in which he describes the wrapper as an indication that the tipping point has arrived for mobile phones to have browsers:

. . . the bit underneath that’s interesting, the “or go to m.yahoo.com using your mobile browser.” Yahoo’s confident enough that people will know their phone has a browser, know how to use it, and be comfortable enough to access the service that they’ll put it in mass-market campaigns. Nice.

The writer is pointing out that a device most parents, teachers and school officials are now carrying, which was once basically a phone, is quickly becoming an Internet browser as well as a phone. That means Internet-based information is increasingly carried by people responsible for the welfare and safety of children. As mobile phones become more powerful and featured Internet browsers, their role in school safety should be developed at the same time. If a child is hurt, the adult in charge should be able to reach help and information quickly. A mobile phone that the adult carries routinely is obviously an ideal means to reach help. With a browser, that mobile phone is also the best means for receiving information directly from where it is archived. At Defywire, making these immediate connections and optimal information delivery operate for the safety of children at school is what we do.

Mobiles phones in responsible hands to deter crime

The government of Liberia has begun a program of giving mobile phones with a free police-calling feature to prominent people in neighborhoods and villages. The report in cellular-news explains:

Liberia’s government has started giving away specially programmed mobile phones to villages so that they can report crimes to the local police. The government project aims to give up to 10 phones to prominent people in each of 400 neighborhoods in and around the capital city, Monrovia.

Crime has become endemic in the country following the demobilization of militia groups which formed during the civil wars of the 1990’s. Most of the young adults who gave up their arms have not found replacement jobs and turned to violent crime. Liberia currently has an approximate 85% unemployment rate, the second highest in the world (The highest is 90% on the tiny island nation of Nauru).

Mobile communication in the hands of responsible people is a new 21st century public safety method. The principle of providing mobile information and communication to responsible adults is an important one underlying the Defywire Mobile Guardian.