Doug Ritter, the man behind the excellent equipped.org website, has posted his review of the recently concluded Outdoor Retailer Summer Market show. He highlights several new water filtration devices, some new knives and flashlights, and a couple of interesting multi-fuel stoves.
Standing out, however, is the SPOT Satellite Messenger device. Take emergency alerting capabilities like a PLB, but then also add the ability to trigger canned email messages that include your current GPS coordinates with an "I'm OK" message. Also add the ability to automatically update your position on Google Maps every 10 minutes and you have a pretty interesting device. I could easily see using this device to keep loved ones well informed about your location and progress while "vagabonding" (traveling without a fixed itinerary). Doug points out a few items of possible concern about the device as well, so be sure to read the in-depth review.
Hopefully some of Dougs concerns will be addressed by Spot. It does seem like a great device if his two main concerns are taken care of.
Posted by: Matt Knowles | 2007.09.13 at 02:11 PM