For fun, try to get you and your friends to spend a few weeks trying to just use coordinates to get around. At several points, try to do it assuming no data connectivity, like what you'd experience in most of Mongolia. Hell, you can experience it in most of Colorado.
It turns out it's a terribly designed addressing system, replacing the numbers with words doesn't make it less terrible, only more memorable.
Assume your magic navigation device goes down, but you can call the destination you are going to and have them give you directions without using street names or designators, only landmarks. Try it from varying distances away. Instead of "turn left at Main st." you'll get "turn left at the second red building, I think, maybe the one with the white window shutters...you don't see one with white window shutters? well they have a restaurant next door with a neon sign...okay after that take the 3rd left, or is it the 4th?"
Or try to figure out not only which building you need to go to in a dense urban core, but which side of the street the building is on? While the coordinates you got put you within 3 meters of the building, the magic map device you're using can't get a lock on more than 2 GPS satellites at once and you're now 30 meters away from your destination.
Okay, so now you make it, and it's a 30 story building with 300 apartments. Which one is it? The coordinates get you near the base of the building, but not to the unit itself?
But that's okay, nobody's bothered to do something sensible like put numbers on their doors, or label the streets so when your app doesn't work you can still locally navigate. You can always wait around for a postman to arrive and ask him.
It turns out it's a terribly designed addressing system, replacing the numbers with words doesn't make it less terrible, only more memorable.
Assume your magic navigation device goes down, but you can call the destination you are going to and have them give you directions without using street names or designators, only landmarks. Try it from varying distances away. Instead of "turn left at Main st." you'll get "turn left at the second red building, I think, maybe the one with the white window shutters...you don't see one with white window shutters? well they have a restaurant next door with a neon sign...okay after that take the 3rd left, or is it the 4th?"
Or try to figure out not only which building you need to go to in a dense urban core, but which side of the street the building is on? While the coordinates you got put you within 3 meters of the building, the magic map device you're using can't get a lock on more than 2 GPS satellites at once and you're now 30 meters away from your destination.
Okay, so now you make it, and it's a 30 story building with 300 apartments. Which one is it? The coordinates get you near the base of the building, but not to the unit itself?
But that's okay, nobody's bothered to do something sensible like put numbers on their doors, or label the streets so when your app doesn't work you can still locally navigate. You can always wait around for a postman to arrive and ask him.