Alert.us app for family safety and communication

Alert.us has launched a mobile application that not only parents will love, but they're hoping kids will love too. That's a tall order to fill considering the app is used to track each family member's whereabouts. Kids don't usually enjoy being tracked by their parents.

According to TechCrunch, the app has the usual safety features of geolocation alerts and an alarm to notify a predefined list of people in case of an emergency so they can respond quickly. To date, there have been no stories (at least none that I've seen) of these apps preventing serious crimes or saving any lives. It could be useful in the case of a kid getting separated from his parents in the mall or accidentally getting on the wrong bus after school.

There are several apps on the market that have these features, but what sets Alert.us apart are its additional features. It has a family message board where families can communicate together privately. It also has a battery alert feature that lets you know when someone's battery is dead. That may reduce the 'He's not answering his phone. He must be dead!' panick some parents have when their child doesn't answer. It will undoubtedly bring up conversations about being responsible and keeping your phone charged at all times, though.

I would imagine that, in order to market it to the younger demographic, there'd have to be a way to turn off some of the app's features. But that would defeat the purpose. How are they going to market this to kids, though? That will be interesting to see in the coming months. So far, the company has not done much marketing at all but still managed to get more than 25,000 users to try the app.

If you'd like to try Alert.us for your family, it's free up to 900 minutes and three alerts. It's $6.99 each month after that. You can get it for iOS, Android or Blackberry devices.

Photo courtesy spcbrass, via Flickr.