The city demands continuous interpretation

Today the experience, infrastructure and morphology of the city are more closely related than ever before. The profusion of handheld electronic devices with increasingly powerful networking capabilities offers its users new modes of interaction within the urban environment. It also provides designers, artists, and theoreticians a new means for engaging and understanding the city. Therefore, forget old ways to describe cities!

Fab wrote:

People of SENSEable City Lab have developed a continuously changing real-time maps of cell phone usage in Graz, Austria. They “track” anonymous data from thousands of mobile phones. The get the data by ‘pinging’ the cell phones, so they probably have an agreement with austrian GSM providers. The project is a means of observing, and reading the city, a tool that traces its evolution and real-time fluctuation.

Info and Pictures via Fab

I didn't listen to this mp3 yet, but it sounds promising.

TV: Location Without GPS

Todd Young represents Rosum Corporation, a company that has developed a way to use unmodified broadcast TV signals for positioning in these places where GPS often fails. These signals penetrate buildings and are already available worldwide.

This critically useful technology is the result of work by Dr. James Spilker, the co-architect of GPS, and Dr. Matthew Rabinowitz, an expert in high-precision navigation systems. It has the potential to revolutionize location positioning and provide a base for the development of helpful new services.

See also:

• Where 2.0
• Rosum Corporation
• Rosum White Paper: A New Positioning System Using Television Synchronization Signals

From Technology and geography: some work in progress by Barry Brown and Louise Barkhuus

In our own work we have studied these issues in a range of conceptual, empirical and design led activities. These two approaches can be categorised as either “space” work, concerned with how specific places and activities are connected together (potentially globally), and “place” work, concerned with the details of interactions in specific places. While we can divide up our work in this way, this is perhaps a difficult distinction to make since many technologies (such as maps) cross over, since although they are used in specific places they are produced as a standardised spatial view.

Via Folksomologies and spatial technologies

Mologogo

Mologogo is a free service that will track a "friends" GPS enabled cell phone from another phone(gps not required) or on the web.

Mologogo is totally "alpha" right now, but improving rapidly. It is was built as a Web 2.0 app, so expect integration with sites like Flickr, Upcoming.org, Judy's book, and lots more RubyOnRails/AJAX-y goodness added to our UI. And with our soon to be released API, you'll be able to access your own location data in other sites.

Update: 12.10.05
Now they have a Wiki too!

Just bought my Nano too, so the Subway Maps on iPod could be cool, if I had a subway...
But hey, do we really need an iPod for that? A mobile phone could do as well, n'est-ce pas?

Another not yet a location-based service, but we are not far: Mobile GMaps. According to M-E-X-Blog it is just way to expensive - without the flatrate.

See also:
Nikolay Klimchuk who is the author of the henson.midp.Float class for float point calculations.
and
Yahoo Maps (not yet mobile)

Semacode + Wikipedia = Semapedia
Check out the learn more section and the blog.

One step more and the Hofburg not only needs a Sema- or QRcode for the place, but uses such codes also inside the building, in their brochures etc. Like in Japan.

Geominder for Series 60 phones

Geominder allows you to create location-based reminders that stay attached to physical locations.

When arriving at a marked location, Geominder can play an alarm and display a stored text note or a voice note previously associated to the location.

A location-based reminder can be much more convenient than standard time-based reminders - for example:

• "When I arrive at the office, remind me to review next week's schedule"
• "When I pass supermarket, remind me to buy vegetables"
• "At home remind me to call Dave"

Geominder can improve your life in many other ways and scenarios, which are only bounded by your imagination!

Geominder uses mobile network's cell id information and doesn't require an extra GPS device. Mobile Network cell id information is free of mobile operator charges and depends on the cell antenna geographic distribution which is usually suited for most common day-to-day uses (for example home - office - shopping). No mobile operator fees are involved in using Geominder.

Via 37signals: Location-based reminders with Geominder

I would like to know more about OneReach. Does anybody know more about it?

One Reach: Blog tool wins innovation prize (BBC, 22.6.05)

The winning software, called OneReach, draws on the current interest in blogging. The tool gives travellers access to blogs specific to the area they are in so they can find useful information and tips. It also creates a map which allows family and friends to follow their exact progress while they are away from home. The tool relies on GPS (Global Positioning System) and requires a smartphone.

[...] For Iain Rosarius from BT, one of the judges of the competition, the key was to see how OneReach was different from other blogging tools on the market.
"I was impressed by the enthusiasm of the team and by the fact that is was very topical, using RSS and location-based software," he said. "It also had some very slick tools. For example if you arrange to meet up with someone, your phone will send you maps of how to get there," he said.

theSpoke: OneReach

Via ifeedyou

From Mobile Media

Third-party-hosted mobile location systems could soon become a reality with the introduction of the soon-to-be-approved Secure User Plane Location standard and a greater willingness by some operators to outsource their network geography information.

The use of SUPL means location servers will no longer have to reside in cellcos’ networks. The server will communicate directly with mobile devices via an IP link – rather than traditional control-plane architecture requiring modifications to core and radio networks – to implement MLS solutions.

Meanwhile, in what could mark a new trend for operators, Orange UK recently announced that it will outsource its network database with information on the whereabouts of base stations and cells, making it available to any third parties willing to pay for the data. The move will help break the cellco-dependence of network-based location-service providers, enabling them to host services independent of carriers.

See also:
Dueling Architectures: Control plane vs. User-plane, Which is right for you? (PDF)
Heise's SUPL-Standard soll Handy-Ortung voranbringen (in german only)

Patholog: Creating Location-Based Web Logs (PDF)
From the conclusion:

The test case was focused to a smaller neighbourhood in Los Angeles, and the result was a dramatically more dense mesh of community-authored content. Published pathologs quickly reflected a more engaging story of community—not simply individual—movement and interaction with the environment.

With increased density, however, comes a problem of superabundance of content. In the future, how will embedded media be filtered so that users only get the content they want, and none of the excess?

Via Netzwissenschaft