October NAC Geographic Products Inc. has announced that Hong Kong, New Zealand, Singapore and Taiwan have been added to the countries and areas digitized with the Universal Addresses and Natural Area Codes, bringing the number of the Universal Address digitized countries and areas to 24: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, United Kingdom, and United States.
Using Universal Addresses to specify locations instead of traditional addresses on location-based services can reduce 80 per cent of input characters, avoid difficulties in inputting addresses with foreign characters, eliminate errors from address databases and extend location-based services to all locations no matter whether there are addresses or not. The 80 per cent of reduction of input is significant in using cellphones, PDAs, and portable navigation systems with a small key pad and a small screen to access location-based services.
People can use universal addresses not only for locations with addresses but also for locations without addresses: bridges, park gates, BBQ tables, park benches, wells, trees, tombstones, street lights, sewage exits, fire hydrants, cable connectors, gas meters, electric wire poles, camping sites, fishing spots and accident locations.
