Pokemon Go game causing real life problems

[CielOnTap]

A video game that uses augmented reality is making players travel to real life locations that the game indicates is a certain building needed for the game play. However, Twitter posts by news media, players and observant people noticing incidents of mishaps/injuries/strangers coming and going by personal dwelling are numerous today regarding Pokémon Go play on mobile devices.

Here's what the hashtag #PokemonGo shows on a Twitter search outcome:
https://twitter.com/search?q=%23PokemonGO&src=tyah

There are comments that old data used to identify buildings by their original purposes decades ago don't reflect that some formerly public places may be personal dwellings in 2016. If technology can be used to make instant or one-day changes, why not changes to data reported to be wrong? Then there are the incidents of injuries that players have when they walk into things or people or robberies that happen when players are targeted by others using the game to locate players.

And as the #Euro2016Final soccer match is being played, the departure of Portuguese soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo from the match (due to injury) is prompting tweeters to post Ronaldo's images from the soccer stadium with the #PokemonGO hashtag. He's not crying over the video game, he's crying due to the injury and lost chance to play with his team mates at this final game.

[CielOnTap]

A Holocaust museum does not want its building part of the Pokémon Go game as the building is about remembering the victims of a terrible regime, not playing a game.

The museum itself, along with many other landmarks, is a “PokeStop” within the game — a place where players can get free in-game items. In fact, there are actually three different PokeStops associated with various parts of the museum.

“Playing the game is not appropriate in the museum, which is a memorial to the victims of Nazism,” Andrew Hollinger, the museum’s communications director, told The Post in an interview. “We are trying to find out if we can get the museum excluded from the game.”

The Holocaust Museum’s plight highlights how apps that layer a digital world on top of the real one, or so-called augmented reality games, can come with unforeseen consequences and raises questions about how much control the physical owner of a space can exert as those two worlds intersect.

https://www.thestar.com/business/2016/07/12/pokemon-go-players-cross-real-world-boundaries-at-holocaust-museum.html

The game creator, Niantic Labs, has sent out a message to remind Pokémon Go players to be alert and safe when they are playing the game, due to recent media stories about how players have encountered non-game situations of various degrees of risk.

Darwin, Australia, police have had to issue communications to discourage players from entering their station to collect Pokémon or pocket monsters in their building. https://www.thestar.com/business/2016/07/07/australian-cops-warn-digital-pokemon-hunters-to-stay-our-of-their-police-station.html

[burnt fare]

Many places are having droughts and I see THIS game has more attention. Could be the best way to get the word out: "I did not know how bad the heat's been until I went to a field that Pokemon Go told me to head there to train."

[deja vu]

People walking into things, getting hurt, kids getting outside to search for Pokemon figures, but still have their heads buried in their phones. The company that created it is reportedly raking in the big bucks as in the billions. A teen found a dead body and talks to the media as if it's no big deal and still on the hunt for water Pokeman.

A game that has injured many and hopefully no one will be seriously ingured or die because of this game. Wonder who is responsible if someone does die, do you sue the manufacturer?

[CielOnTap]

Even though the game is not yet open to Canadians through Canadian accounts, there are players accessing the game through US accounts.

I did see a tweet retweeted by Twitter Canada that was posted by the RCMP Manitoba about hidden Pokémon attached to a cruiser:
https://twitter.com/rcmpmb/status/753262037749202944

[CielOnTap]

More accidents and robberies connected with game play in the United States:

One man fell 75 to 100 feet. As firefighters rescued the man, they found the second man unconscious 50 feet down the bluff, said Battalion Chief Robbie Ford of the Encinitas Fire Department. Both were taken to area trauma centers and suffered moderate injuries, he said.

The men, according to firefighters, had crossed a fenced area to get to the bluff.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-pokemon-go-players-stabbed-fall-off-cliff-20160714-snap-story.html

[CielOnTap]

Besides another mishap story about the game (someone crashed their car into a tree while playing the game), there's a good story about the game-
a pinned tweet for Pokémon Go players to drop lures near hospitals where child patients can have a chance to catch Pokémon there! Fortunately I follow someone who retweeted the post so here it is:

https://twitter.com/CatchEmAlI

[CielOnTap]

The game officially opened to Canadians yesterday and the popularity of the game led to a server overload.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2016/07/17/pokemon-go-officially-launches-in-canada-crashes-apps-servers.html

Safety reminders are being shared for all players to look at intersections at drivers and for clear lanes before crossing them-do not keep eyes down on the phones!

The New York Police Department has issued a series of guidelines as the Pokémon Go craze gears up.

They include: “Be alert at all times,” “Do not drive while using the app” and “Do not trespass onto private property, and be aware of closing times at parks and other public places.”

Capt. Christopher M. McIntosh of the NYPD Central Park Detachment issued the warning after people jumped out of the cars and ran into the park last Thursday to chase down a Vaporeon (which is apparently very rare in the Pokémon world).

https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2016/07/18/nypd-issues-pokmon-go-guidelines-in-wake-of-stampede.html

[no1home]

Don't like it, don't play it, and for most it seems to be an obsession. To the point relationships, friendships, work are being lost, at least one company issued an warning that if you play at work, you are out the door.

A good friend of mine is obsessed, called me to get a number for a cleaning lady I know because her and her roommate haven't cleaned their house in over 6 weeks. now 9, and they own 4 cats. Plays every waking moment when not at work, if they still have jobs. Saturday use to be her day for her horse and then Dungeons & Dragons at night, now Pokeman has taken hold and her Saturdays are now chasing these imaginary creatures.

People finding dead bodies and not blinking an eye, just go on their way to find more creatures. They only talk about the game and have their heads buried in their phones the entire time.

Sure some are using it to lose weight because there is a lot of walking involved, but even they seem to become lost in the game. Driving and searching for them, walking into traffic when not paying attention, falling off cliffs, into fountains, doors/poles etc. People getting up in the middle of night searching for these creatures, one teen shot because he invaded private property in the middle of the night. Lots of trespassers have the police called on them, the makers of the game asked to move locations that they plant these creatures as they are showing up on military bases, businesses, private homes. It is clearly out of control when it costs one so much. That they only talk to the other gamers searching for them and throw away family and friendships because they don't play.

What are your experiences with the game?

[fishandchips]

Canadian spies have a guidebook telling them why playing Pokémon Go could be a real issue for them.
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2016/11/20/canadas-spies-have-a-new-risk-pokemon.html

After all the summer hype, it seemed that the game kind of lost social media speed by September. People are playing
but the buzz has moved along elsewhere. When the game was not yet in Canada, all tips and posts were how to get the US version.
Then Canada got the game and news media wrote about Poke stops in inconvenient places that people were pointing out. Think it was a two week hot air deal then pff--all quiet.