October 28th, 2005
LG Cell Phone with Breathalyzer gaining popularity
By Michael Santo
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
The world’s first sports car phone with alcohol Breathalyzer has gotten tremendous popularity in Korea. The cell phone by LG was a big hit from the beginning mainly because its outward appearance of a sports. Equipped with an alcohol measurement sensor, the LG-SD410, LG-KP4100, and LG-LP4100 have sold over 200,000 in the four months that it has been available, and is still selling around 1500 per day.
Having an alcohol measurement device attached to something like a cell phone is nothing but brilliant, especially among younger crowds who regularly drink after work or school and like to party. To use the sensor an intoxicated individual simply opens the phone and blows on the sensor, the LCD will tell you whether your level of alcohol in your blood is safe to drive.
Besides the alcohol measurement feature of this cell phone it is equipped with an advanced remote control for your TV, DVD and karaoke machine, etc. These two functions make this sports car phone appealing to most youths.
According to the National Center for Injury and Prevention Control, Alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes kill someone every 31 minutes and non-fatally injure someone every two minutes in the US. Maybe, it’s time to bring this technology to North America? Source: MobileMag
We Say: Ideally, people should be able to control their alcohol intake on their own. But anything that prevents accidents and deaths is probably worth looking at. These are selling like hotcakes in Korea, apparently.
degustibus says:
Years ago they tried putting breathalyzers in bars. The theory was it would enable people to see their blood alcohol level, and if impaired, take a cab or call a friend or wait until the BAC goes down.
Problem was, the drinkers soon started using it as a competitive game:: How high can you get–or I can get higher than you…. Portable breathalyzers have been around for years — Radioshack used to sell them — the problem was that the market didn’t catch on. Since alcohol affects the judgment, one can expect that people will either not use the device, or not use it as intended.
I wouldn’t disagree with this: “But anything that prevents accidents and deaths is probably worth looking at.”
I suspect that there is no data on alcohol-related accidents and deaths in Korea. Since the legal limit in Korea is .052 (see wikipedia, compare with US .08), one hardly needs a breathalyzer — one or two drinks will get you to that level quite nicely.
I did find this 1999 report:
“For example between 1985 and 1995 the number of traffic deaths increased 1.4 times. In response to this increase, in 1992 the Korean government implemented an intensive five-year traffic accident reduction effort. As a result, the number of deaths has been decreasing since 1992, with the total number of deaths decreasing from 13,429 in 1991 to 10,323 in 1995. The number of alcohol-related traffic deaths has increased by an average of 12.7 percent annually. The ratio of alcohol-related to total deaths has also increased from 3.1 percent in 1990 to 6.7 percent in 1995. Analyzed in terms of age groups, 75.6 percent of the alcohol-related accidents involved drivers 21-40 years-old.”
http://www.icadts.org/reporter/v10n1.html
October 29th, 2005 at 11:15 am
Alice says:
degustibus - we need you writing for this site. Send me some postings. alice@realtechnews.com
October 29th, 2005 at 5:15 pm