Movies on the Move
Remember Earthcomber, the free communities based mapping software? If you don’t, now is an excellent time to reacquaint yourself with it, and check out its newest feature “Movies on the Move.”
Movies on the Move is great if you’re out with your friends and suddenly decide you want to go see a movie. With a few simple clicks, you can find out what’s playing, where it’s playing, and lots more detailed information. But this feature is even better for those times you find yourself in a new or strange town and don’t know where the closest theater is, no less what’s playing.
Earthcomber’s Movies on the Move spot guide will locate the nearest theater based on your gps signal, your last location, the city or landmark, or the maps you have loaded. It’s as simple as pulling up the Movies spot guide, and making a few simple choices: New Releases, Box Office Top 10, or Movies Index (alphabetical).
Once you chose the movie that interests you, you’re taken to a screen with an official movie poster, and a fairly detailed synopsis. Beneath the movie poster, you can click on ‘Find this movie near me.’ This will take you to a “combed” screen showing all the theaters within your pre-defined distance parameters. From here you can also see show times, and then get directions.
This is where it’s so convenient to use if you happen to be in a strange place. You can determine the nearest theater based on your gps location, and not even worry about where you are.
Still free, Earthcomber is making the entire US a very friendly neighborhood.
Related Links
Download Earthcomber for Windows Mobile.
Purchase a GPS receiver to use with Earthcomber.
Discuss GPS navigation in the mytreo.net/forum.
Filed under: Software reviews
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Until Earthcomber delivers maps OTA to my SD card it will never stay on my Treo more than a few days.
TeleNav while it costs $9.99 per month is a better GPS navigation software all around.
And the new Google Maps for Treo http://www.google.com/gmm/index.html will allow you to search for businesses located on the visible map. It’s only missing GPS capabilities. My bet is on this app for complete google maps with turn by turn nav, gps, and OTA maps in the not too distant future.
Earthcomber is not a navigation software. It is a community. Neither Telenav nor Google maps will tell you what’s playing at the local theater, or give you the hole in the wall restaurant that’s not on a commercial map, but listed by another community member.
Earthcomber DOES deliver maps OTA - not sure if it’s direct to SD but as long as you have the RAM you can move it over. The interface is a bit hokey, but the potential of this program (if some serious design and usability issues are addressed) is very good.
Googlemaps has stolen some of their thunder, but if they went more in the direction of making a “Vindigo 4.0″ (since Vindigo will probably never get past 2.0) they certainly have a niche. Also, Googlemaps presently has no GPS, no way to bookmark, few of the capabilities of Earthcomber’s listing features, etc.
If Earthcomber can work toward a better streamlined hybrid of online/offline data they most certainly have a shot at success.