How would you describe your location in three words?
Answering that question is essentially the concept of what3words, an app, created by a London start-up, designed to determine your exact location anywhere in the world.
Launched in 2013, the app’s developers divided the world into 57 trillion squares, each measuring 3m by 3m (10ft by 10ft) and each having a unique, randomly assigned three-word address.
The app (Android and iOS) is now proving to be a useful source for the emergency services, making it easier to locate someone in need of urgent help.
“Call centre operators can receive a request from someone in distress, get a three-word address from them, then communicate that to officers on the ground who have our app on their phone,” Giles Rhys Jones, chief marketing officer of what3Words, said in an interview.
For everyday use, the app makes it easier to locate friends, colleagues and family members in large cities or unfamiliar areas.
With endless possibilities and uses, here are the what3word codes for the top 10 landmarks in London.
1. Buckingham Palace: fence.gross.bats
2. The Shard: unit.blend.offer
3. London Eye: bikes.audio.half
4. Big Ben: clean.wider.both
5. 10 Downing Street: slurs.this.shark
6. Tower of London: heads.guides.hunter
7. Oxford Street: behave.pots.fine
8. St Paul’s Cathedral: type.heat.sketch
9. The National Gallery: feed.quiet.copper
10. Shakespeare’s Globe: loves.dreams.oasis
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