Ensure that every cellphone base-station is equipped with basic weather condition collection equipment. The station is already equipped with the means to communicate the data to a central station, so the overhead of providing this service is minimal.
Accurate weather forecasting depends partly upon a high density of observations - this idea will not address the problem of collecting data over the oceans, but with the increasing density of cell-phone coverage, should ensure a better means of tracking weather systems, albeit at generally low altitudes.-- AbsintheWithoutLeave, Jan 10 2005 Walking Geiger Counter Walking_20Geiger_20Counter [theircompetitor, Jan 10 2005] Temperature Phone Temperature_20Phone! [theircompetitor, Jan 10 2005] Damn you, Nokia! http://www.electric...sensing-on-mobiles/ [AbsintheWithoutLeave, Sep 24 2008] App Feeds Scientists Atmospheric Data from Thousands of Smartphones http://www.technolo...nds-of-smartphones/An Android app that measures atmospheric pressure is now feeding that distributed data to scientists working on better ways to predict the weather. [Dub, Feb 05 2013] Rain tracked with mobile network. http://www.bbc.co.u...nvironment-21290976A way to measure rainfall using mobile phone network signals [AusCan531, Feb 05 2013] Cellphone radio telescope Cellphone_20radio_20telescope [hippo, Feb 05 2013] More cellphone sensors in links-- theircompetitor, Jan 10 2005 [tc] The idea is to put the weather data collection functions in the fixed base-stations, not the phones themselves.-- AbsintheWithoutLeave, Jan 10 2005 would work better in the handsets anyway because the field of information would be more greatly dispersed. as an adjunct to this idea, what about we link it to massive gaia-like computer simulation programmes that develop memory from repeated multi-point mapping of weather systems?-- williamsmatt, Sep 26 2008 //would work better with handsets// "sorta close, muggy, 98.6 degrees..."-- FlyingToaster, Feb 05 2013 random, halfbakery