A must-have iPhone application for people who drive a lot is Trapster – the app for avoiding speed traps.

Crowdsourcing has become a popular means of gathering data in the 2.0 world The way it works is pretty straightforward: when drivers see a speed trap, they post that information to Trapster via their mobile device, thus alerting folks who follow in their wake. Which sounds great, you know, except for the part about driving and fiddling with a cell phone.

But anyway, Trapster is available on the iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Windows Mobile and Nokia/Symbian (I wouldn’t be surprised to see it for Palm in the near future, either). It’s had more than 1 million downloads, and is “getting about 50,000 downloads a day right now” to add to that.

Which just makes it all the more valuable. Trapster relies on users to report speed traps when they see them, making the road safe for other Trapster users who come later. The more users, the more data, and the safer the roads are for speeders.

The site has endorsements from various police officers and organizations, such as “If someone slows down because of (Trapster), it’s accomplishing the same goal of trying to get people to obey the speed limit.

No wonder distracted-driving accidents are on the rise...

Some advice I have for people that make heavy use of the reports: Leave earlier.

It's GPS based, so unless you're actively posting new sightings (bad idea), it's like a radar detector....the device just alarms you you're entering a reported hotspot.

It's saved Ed at least one reckless op citation.......

I have it. I used it and almost died trying too. I think the latest update for it allows a pre programmed route then it alerts you when you get close to a trap. The old version you had to stare at it as you drove - fail.

Eyes are the best radar detector...
Spotted one on the turnpike on Monday and had plenty of time to slow down before my radar detector went off from his laser.

Also how do you know people arent posting bogus spots?

Jammers are nice too!

But yes Laser = A real fast reading, the other ones, if you have a good detector, you`ll read it and should have enough time to get within a reasonable speed to avoid everything!

I love trapster when I had unlimited data plan. The version I had for my mogul tied into GPS and data. If you left trapster up you just hit a button to report a trap of whatever type you encountered. Not sure the one E was using, but mine had audible alerts that would sound. Now you can actually download most current version of the map into your GPS and it adds the traps as points of interest in addition to route selection.

I agree eyes are the best, but when I drove out for the inauguration, the closer I got to the DC metro area, the more people were using it and the better it worked. It was letting me know about speed traps 2-3 miles away.

I heard it also now works with phones without GPS using cell tower triangulation, but if you have a phone with GPS and unlimited data, it is well worth it. I am waiting for them to get bought by Tom Tom, Garmin or Navteq.

you drive a 3, it's not like you were speeding anyway

says the guy with the car that has the agility of a brick

New version out, looks like its even easier to use than before. Jalopnik review here:

http://jalopnik.com/5480294/how-to-avoi ... our-iphone

Eric couldn't see the speed traps because his version is too busy giving him directions to the locations of all the nearest hollisters.

Fixed