On a (road) ride earlier in the week, I misjudged the onset of darkness and returned home after it was dark. Fortunately I had portable lights with me. Wife was upset (Awww...she does care about me). Before yesterday's ride, she insisted that I begin sharing my location on my cell phone with her. I hope that wasn't a mistake. Her words "I need to know where to begin looking for your carcass when you don't come back."

Dan

She loves you. Why would location sharing be a mistake?

Should have texted or called to let her know you were ok.

My family and I use the 'Find My Friends' iPhone app pretty regularly. At a glance and without bothering each other, we can figure out where we're all at to coordinate. I can see if my wife's at the gym, she can see if I'm still at the office, I can see if my daughter's at a friend's house like she claimed to be, etc.

When there's an occasion where I don't want people to know where I'm at, like when I'm shopping for Christmas or birthday gifts, I just stop sharing my location temporarily.

Congratulations! She has decided you are a keeper.

My wife wants me to ride with the live tracking from my cycling app turned on, so she can keep an eye on me and make sure I'm not laying out dead somewhere. She at first had the attitude of, "If someone wanted to kidnap you this would make it really easy." As if someone would ever want to kidnap me. Hope they don't ask for a high ransom, they might get a couple hundred bucks. But she soon saw the advantage of being able to see where I am when I ride just to know that I'm safe, and I suspect a little bit of knowing that I'm actually out riding and not visiting a girlfriend or something.

Just make sure your butt isn't sitting in a bar stool for a couple of hours. And my better half always reminds me when the life insurance bills are paid up, nice.

My wife is good about not tracking me on my rides. However, I do turn on Live Track when I do charity rides or my cross state ride. If it makes her happy, then I'm happy.

My husband is sort of creeped out that my high tech car is always letting the Ford cloud know my location not to mention the fact that my iPhone is also broadcasting my location in a variety of ways.

I tell him that if I ever fail to check in after one of my long outdoor adventures (hiking and/or biking) then he will have some data to try to locate me.

Its all in love for sure!

...and if you have a toll transponder like E-Z Pass, Fastrak, or I-Pass, that's used to track your car as well, and not just at toll plazas. License plate cameras are all over the place now, too. And retail stores track your phone via WiFi signals, whether or not you actually connect to their wireless network. There really isn't much privacy anymore for anyone who's "on the grid".

If you really want to get creepy, think about the prospect of surveillance cameras and facial recognition software. Tie a camera system into a database that cross-references faces and identifying information (like driver license data at DMV), and you can be positively ID'd pretty much anywhere.

Anyway, getting back to the original topic... The choice isn't whether or not you want to share your location data. It's whether you want to add your spouse to the list of entities who can already access your location data.

[MENTION=232461]SkyDog75[/MENTION] - yep, I have an I-Pass too. I'm not creeped out about being tracked. With all my adventures out in the woods, I would hate to disappear and my poor husband not have a clue where to find me. The stories of those who are found months or even years after their demise in the wilderness really creeps me out.

I always share my location with my wife via the Google Maps app whenever I go out for a ride. I don't consider it a creepy or trust or stalking issue, but a matter of safety if I don't get back for whatever reason.

The trick is to have two phones, so that your girlfriend thinks you are with your wife, and your wife thinks you are with your girlfriend. Then you can have a nice long peaceful ride with no phone.

And eventually you will have nice long rides with neither wife nor girlfriend to worry about.


-Tim-

Then you can get rid of the damn phones!

Win/win/win/win/win

Back when I was ultra running, my wife was concerned about if I was in trouble or just still out running. So used a tracker which pinged her when I left and came back so she could just link up, see where I was and if I was still on the move. On one instance during summer I left home before sunrise. About 11 in the morning she realized I wasn’t out in the yard, then checked her phone and noticed I was on a run.
Not riding far or long enough to use it again, at the most riding a few hours.
I guess I get the concern, though you do feel kinda ‘watched’.

Yep, you have to share. If she perceives that you are hesitant, she will write her own reality about why you don't want to.

RoadID has a breadcrumb trail app for this, don't think you need a RoadID for it to work.

roog

My wife wants to know how close I am to getting home, that way she can send the boyfriend away before I arrive.

Cyclemeter can be set to send an email with your current location at selectable intervals.

Because someone loving you would be trusting enough to leave you to your doings without being able to track you at any given moment. She could've just called, or assumed that an adult man won't instantly crash and die or get mugged and stabbed the moment it turns dark.

My wife insisted I put on the Life360 app after my phone was having a bad day and decided to butt dial her. She thought all the heavy breathing she heard was me lying in a ditch, dying on the side of the road. I don't really care one way or the other.

Well, not a mistake per se. If she truly wants to know where I am on a ride she can now get a visual instead of txting...which I won't answer while riding, or actually calling...which I may answer on a ride depending who it's from. I don't like to stop for this sort of thing, especially in the winter. It's too cold to stop.

About time! We've been married more than twenty-five years.

She does a lot of "her own reality" writing as it is. She writes romance novels. We tell her that she "makes $hit up for a living."

Dan

My wife loves me. She worries when I'm out on my bike. So, if just by turning on Garmin Live Track makes her feel better, I don't see any reason not to. Also, if I'm on a ride that is going to be longer than 1 hour, I'll stop about half way through and either text or call her to let her know I'm ok. These are both very easy things to do without any downside to them. Why not?