Geogoer

Our new project, Open Transport Network

2010-12-09T07:19:00.000-08:00

We have recently been working on a public and commercial transport project Open Transport Network, where passengers can find transit schedules, routes and other transit related information, and yesterday was its first day as a public website. We are starting out with a few agencies in San Francisco and Sacramento (BART, SF Muni and Sacramento Regional Transit), so if you live in the Bay area and use public transit, we'd love to hear from you. If you live elsewhere, do not worry - over the coming weeks we will be uploading the data of transit agencies in multiple cities across the United States and the world, and try to make the world of transportation a bit more organized :)

So feel free to check it out and let us know if you have any comments. By the way, if you would like to see the Open Transport Network in your city or provide your own schedules, please drop us a line!

Ex-mayor of Vilnius buys a London taxi

2010-10-19T08:14:00.000-07:00

Arturas Zuokas, the mayor of Vilnius during 2000-2007, is no stranger to innovative ideas - such as a free bicycle scheme for Vilnius and live streaming of the mayor's office over the internet among others. His latest idea? In September Mr. Zuokas bought a London taxi.

What prompted this purchase? “Well, I always liked the design of London taxis, it is a classic design, which has a certain history and a certain charm”, he says to lrytas.lt. “It is also a timeless model, it does not get old.”

But this is just part of the story. Having previously used a chauffeured BMW 7, Mr. Zuokas says that he does not really need a car in the city, as the journeys are usually short and his personal driver spends most of the time waiting to pick his boss up. Hence the new taxi – which will be available not only to him, but also to the citizens and guests of the city – as a regular taxi.

This approach has a number of advantages, Mr. Zuokas says. A taxi can use public transport lanes thereby being faster in traffic, it can enter the restricted Old Town zones, inaccessible to private cars. And the taxi is used not only for Mr. Zuokas own needs, but also for those of other people.

Mr. Zuokas envisions that this could become a broader iniciative if public institutions and municipalities adopted the same approach. “For instance, ministers, mayors, and department heads also have cars with personal drivers, who spend most of the time waiting until the officials have to be transported from one place to another. If they were operating as taxis, other people and employees of the institution could use them as well,” he explains on his blog. “It would be a more efficient way of spending taxpayers' money, and the government would be closer to the people,” he adds.

Two films on open transit data

2010-10-06T02:11:00.000-07:00

As the open data initiatives are gaining momentum, below are two short movies covering open transit data initiatives, including Portland's Trimet, MassDOT, San Francisco's BART and other innovators.

by GOODMagazine via @ITSWorld

by Streetfilms.

Geogoer in the Financial Times

2010-08-25T14:58:00.000-07:00

Geooger has recently been covered in the Financial Times as part of a story on ambitious start-ups that chose to start their businesses in Britain. The article is here - free registration is needed to view it.

The Difference Engine in Lithuania

2010-07-12T04:55:00.000-07:00

On July 15-18 guests from the UK and the Difference Engine will be visiting Lithuania - and it is very exciting to welcome them here!

The delegation includes Jon Bradford, the founder of The Difference Engine; Jonathan Shrago, founder of Tagorize, Seedcamp 2009 finalist, and a participant of the Difference Engine; Stewart Townsend, start-up master a.k.a. the man in the shirt, who was previously behind the Sun Start-up Essentials Programme, and Annely Lautre from UK Trade and Investment.

They will be spending a few days in Vilnius and Kaunas - meeting local start-ups, participating in a few events and doing some tech / general sightseeing, so if you are into technology, start-ups, entrepreneurship, or would just like to show Lithuania to the guests - register for any part of the programme below:

Thursday, July 15

16:30 Short tour of Vilnius Old Town. REGISTER.

18:00 Start-up event in Vilnius with pitches, talks and networking, followed by drinks. REGISTER.

Friday, July 16

14:00 Trip to Trakai. If you would like to join, REGISTER HERE.

18:00 Start-up Weekend meets Mobile Monday event for all start-up enthusiasts in Kaunas. REGISTER HERE.

Saturday, July 17

10:00 Office hours in Vilnius. Start-ups wishing to have a one-on-one conversation with the guests, please REGISTER FOR OFFICE HOURS HERE.

14:00 Trip to Grutas park. If you would like to participate, JOIN HERE.

Sunday, July 18

11:00 Office hours in Kaunas. Start-ups, REGISTER FOR OFFICE HOURS HERE.

14:30 Tour around Kaunas.

If you have any questions or suggestions, please contact Dalia (d@geogoer.com) or Ksistof (k@geogoer.com), or organizers of the start-up events directly.

See you soon!

Geogoer is now a multinational company

2010-06-23T12:04:00.000-07:00

As of this week, Ksistof will be representing us from Lithuania. Grab a coffee with him if you are in Vilnius :)

London Demo Day in a picture

2010-06-08T07:27:00.000-07:00

by @lucyjspence

Drive the real traffic (yes, cars) to your site

2010-06-01T03:32:00.000-07:00

There are plenty ways of driving traffic to your website, such as links, tweets, social media, search engines, you name it; but today we are very excited to introduce something new. It is a tool to drive the actual traffic - cars, buses and coaches - to your site. And you can do it within 30 seconds – say hello to the Geogoer Travel button!

When you click the button two things happen: you get all the travel options to your location and a possibility to offer your own transportation. So your users are finally able to find or self-organize transportation to your event, office or venue.
A few examples are below:

The button is here. So check it out and let us know where you embed it!

The Difference Engine TV - Episode 4

2010-05-26T18:23:00.000-07:00

The Difference Engine Episode 4 from The Difference Engine on Vimeo.

Episode 3 of the Difference Engine TV - Mentors on Mentorship

2010-05-10T03:21:00.000-07:00

The Difference Engine Episode 3 from The Difference Engine on Vimeo.

You can now login to Geogoer with your Facebook, Google, Yahoo and other accounts!

2010-04-27T02:59:00.000-07:00

Check this out at Geogoer.

The Difference Engine TV - Episode 2

2010-04-26T03:58:00.000-07:00

The Difference Engine Episode 2 from The Difference Engine on Vimeo.

Further episodes coming on thedifferenceengine.tv!

Instructions for posting ride sharing information by Twitter on Geogoer Lite

2010-04-19T02:02:00.000-07:00

In order to help with the volcano travel disruption, we have started an accelerated and simplified version of the ride sharing service - Geogoer Lite. The service allows posting ride sharing and travel information through Twitter. These rides are then made searchable at lite.geogoer.com.

Below are two EXAMPLES of posting a trip by tweeting:

@gglite London > Paris / looking for a ride for two people

Amsterdam > Barcelona / I can share a car early next week, anyone needs a lift? @gglite

MUST USE SYMBOLS: > / @gglite

These trips will be posted on lite.geogoer.com, where they can be searched based on origin and destination of the trip. The trips will have a link to the original Twitter account, thereby allowing people to contact you through Twitter.

A quick update on Iceland volcano travel

2010-04-18T04:39:00.000-07:00

In addition to www.geogoer.com, you may also find rides or travellers in the following sites:
- Carpool Europe
- When Volcanoes Erupt: A Survival Guide for Stranded Travelers
- www.roadsharing.com
- Twitter with tags #ashtag, #getmehome

We will be posting updates on travel shortly, in the meantime if you have any other locations on the web - please let us know in the comments.

We also especially ask to post on Geogoer.com if you have a few spare seats in your car or bus, as the demand for transport is immense.

The Difference Engine TV - Episode 1!

2010-04-15T03:47:00.000-07:00

The Difference Engine Episode 1 from The Difference Engine on Vimeo.

A month at the Difference Engine

2010-04-11T16:32:00.000-07:00

It has been more than a month since we arrived to the Difference Engine – the start-up acceleration programme in Middlesbrough in which we are currently participating – and it has been quite a ride. Over the first several weeks we did a complete change of our business model and redirected our focus into a rather different market than initially expected. Together with the other eight teams participating in the programme, we also met a number of mentors and guests from leading technology companies, who shared their experience, gave feedback on our product and performed “surgeries” of our ideas.

The purpose of the first month of the programme is to refine the idea and product and decide on the direction we want to go further, therefore the schedule during March was pretty intense. An usual day at the Difference Engine would include having a number of one-to-one sessions with mentors, during which teams show their products and obtain feedback on their ideas, or listening to presentations in business and technology. For us, the feedback from mentors and guests was extremely valuable, and we got plenty of very practical and actionable advice on how to develop Geogoer further.

At the moment we are entering the second phase of the Difference Engine, which is called build. During this stage we will be building and adapting Geogoer to meet the needs of our clients, as well as meeting other potential clients which may benefit from car sharing. This process has already started, so it is extremely exciting to see the potential opportunities ahead. Stay tuned, further developments will be coming soon.

P.S. A note from our CTO: the message system is being upgraded to run 10 650 times faster.

Another Sunday in the office

2010-04-11T15:20:00.000-07:00