From the All Things Ironic and Ursine Department:
Nextgov is running a review of the U.S. Forest Service’s Smokey Bear app this week, part of our Building Better Apps running feature.
Smokey’s app is designed to give users information about how to safely build a forest fire. Our private sector reviewers thought the app builders made a big mistake by requiring an Internet connection to access some basic information. Finding the Internet, they reasoned, wouldn’t always be easy in the middle of a forest.
That was a broad generalization, though.
As luck would have it, Nextgov’s Editor at Large Bob Brewin works out of Las Vegas, N.M., about three-and-a-half hours north of Smokey’s birthplace in Smokey Bear Park in Capitan, N.M. He reported Wednesday that Sprint and Verizon have plans to provide service in the park but AT&T does not.
That’s bad news for any AT&T subscribers who wanted to use Smokey’s app to safely build a campfire in his namesake park.
Joseph Marks
Joseph Marks covers government technology issues, social media, Gov 2.0 and global Internet freedom for Nextgov. He previously reported on federal litigation and legal policy for Law360 and on local, state and regional issues for two Midwestern newspapers. He also interned for Congressional Quarterly’s Homeland Security section and the Associated Press’s Jerusalem Bureau. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Wisconsin and a master’s in international affairs from Georgetown.
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