If you've ever driven around a city desperately in search of
a parking spot, here's what you needed. A new system aims to allow drivers to
buy and sell information about free spots.
The software, called TruCentive, is effectively a market for
parking spaces, or what project leader Baik Hoh of Nokia Research Center in
Palo Alto, California, calls parking availability data. Other programs, like
PrimoSpot and Google's Open Spot (which was shuttered in June), have relied on
good Samaritans to broadcast their parking activity with no incentive. By
contrast, TruCentive rewards users with system credits that can later be used
to buy information on parking spots in turn.