What that means is that if you’re cruising along a highway and there’s a traffic jam ahead, you’ll get a warning from someone stuck in the jam who decided to be nice and inform the world about it.

It’s not only for traffic jams, police traps, accidents, speed cameras, broken traffic lights and any number of ‘Custom’ events can be flagged up. What’s more, when these obstructions are flagged up by other users and if they’re in the way of your route, Waze will automatically alter your course so you can avoid them.

Despite all these features, it takes a community to make Waze what it should be; and there is a shortage of alerts with community activity being sporadic. However, the reason for the afore mentioned lack of community is that the program is still in beta (even alpha for some devices), plus the fact that it takes time for an active community to build up. In time, this will make an extremely useful app. Definitely worth having, especially for the commuter.

For more details watch demo video below:

Check out Waze @ www.waze.com (by Dean Sherwin)

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Additionally users can watch or share motor vehicle related videos, ask questions through the discussion forum, browse through the listing of auto parts for sale or list their own items.

Features:

• Social network for car, boat, plane and bike enthusiasts.
• Meet and share opinions with others.
• Get updates on upcoming events.
• Join groups or participate in exciting challenges.
• Section to share photos and videos also included.
• Buy, sell or trade vehicles or parts.

Check out MotorTopia @ www.motortopia.com (Added by Tehseen RechargeYourMind.com)

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• Honk: Social Network For Car Buyers
• GasForFree: Place Ads on your Car and Earn Free Gas
• Fuelly: Track, Share and Compare your Gas Mileage

Features:

• Calculate fuel cost of journey between 2 locations in US
• Calculator automatically takes into account the up-to-date gasoline prices and your car model details
• Gasoline prices supplied by Fuel Gauge Report, EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and OPIS (Oil Price Information Service)
• View today’s’ average gasoline prices in different US geographical regions
• Free, no registration needed.
• Similar websites: DrivePricing and Fuelly.

Check out FuelCostCalculator @ www.fuelcostcalculator.com

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• GasForFree: Place Ads on your Car and Earn Free Gas

How it works:

1. Sign up and estimate your personal monthly fuel consumption online
2. Buy a plan. Lock-in the gas at the current price for 3 to 24 months.
3. If prices go up, you will get a refund for the price difference. If prices go down, you can buy the gas at cheaper actual rates

This service works well, if you are certain that gas prices will increase in the future. On the other hand, if prices go down, you will benefit from lower prices but will still have to pay the fee for each booked gallon over the period of your plan (around $0.28 – 0.40 per gallon, depending on the lock-in period).

See PetroFix explained on CNN Energy Fix.

Features:

• Hedge against future gas price increases by locking-in a fixed price for a gas
• Lock-in a fixed price for 3 to 24 months
• Estimate your fuel consumption online
• If gas prices increase, receive money refund from the company for the price difference

Check out PetroFix @ www.petrofix.com (via TechCrunch)

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To check the accident stats in your area, simply enter a city name, zip code and click on the “GO” button. Yhen you should see accidents in your area shown on the map marked with different color markers. Each color representing particular number of incidents. To learn more about specific accident simply click on its marker.

Features:

• Find out fatal traffic accident rates in your area.
• All accidents are presented on the map with colored markers.
• The data is obtained from National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
• To check your area, simply enter city name, zip code or address.
• Free. No signup needed.
• US only.

Check out RiskyRoads @ www.riskyroads.org

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How it works:

1. Select Year, Make and Model of the car
2. Press “Find Parts”
3. Choose auto parts category
4. Select item
5. Compare prices & select the vendor

Features:

• Car parts price comparison shopping.
• Search & compare prices from over 50 retailers
• Narrow down search results by parts type, car brand, category, parts brand.
• See what other vehicles does a particular part fits with.
• Free, no registration.

Check out FrugalMechanic @ www.frugalmechanic.com

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Features:

• Download high quality car wallpapers for free.
• Search, browse by category and rate.
• Check out top rated and featured wallpapers.
• Eembed any wallpapers onto your blog or forum.
• No signup needed

Check out Autoknock @ www.autoknock.com

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- how much you are paying for a tank of fuel,
- how much you have paid in total,
- the amount you have saved,
- and so on.

You can even compare your fuel consumption with some other user who has the same type of car. By looking at all these data you can find out how much money you can save on gas with small driving changes.

It further lets you browse MPG (miles per gallon) data for differen car models. Almost 4000 car models represented.

Features:

• Track gas mileage and see how much you can save.
• Check out data of other drivers with similar cars.
• See how your mileage compares with EPA estimates.
• Get MPG data for different car models.
• Tips to minimize the fuel consumption.
• Check out tips and a discussion forum section for advice.
• Access Fuelly website directly from your mobile phone.

Talking about fuel consuption and costs I think you might be also interested in one article we have published couple of months ago. See “6 Smart Websites To Save Money on Gas“. Also see GasForFree (free gas in exchange for ads on your car), FuelMeUp (gas prices in your area) and MyMileMaker.

Check out Fuelly @ www.fuelly.com

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Drive Pricing calculates the total length of the trip and gas cost. The gas cost estimation is heavily based on the MPG (miles per gallon) value you provide, so make sure you enter that value correctly. If you’re not 100% sure about the MPG value for your car, find it out on fueleconomy.gov .

Go to Drive Pricing @ www.drivepricing.com

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Features:

• Place adds on your car in exchange for free gas.
• Your vehicle should not be older then 1999.
• You must drive at least 1,250 miles per month*.
• You must have a valid Driver’s License, insurance and be the registered owner of the vehicle.
• Available only to US drivers.

* some exceptions apply for shorter commutes in high-density, metropolitan areas

Check out Gas For Free @ www.gasforfree.com (via Mashable)

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