2008 Horizon Report Australia-New Zealand Edition

Two to Three Years: Geolocation

Time-to-Adoption Horizon: Two to Three Years
It is becoming increasingly easy to capture and use geolocative data associated with photographs, videos, and other media. Often, these data are automatically captured by your device, transparently, enabling simple, readily available tools to create mashups of data and maps that are changing the way we understand, display, and analyse information. One’s own location can be gathered and transmitted using common devices like mobile phones and laptop computers, enabling Internet services to customize a visitor’s experience based on where he or she is in the real world. These two features of geolocation — placement of media and of people in the physical world — have implications for research, data visualization, and social networking.

Overview

Geolocation technology is not new, but can now be rendered so small that it is now beginning to appear in a range of common devices like mobile phones, cameras, and other handheld devices. As a result, the ability to record and transmit geolocative data is available to almost anyone. Hand- encoding geolocative data is time-consuming and cumbersome, but that is changing as ordinary tools gain the capability to encode that data automatically. It will soon be very common for most photos in online collections to “know” where they were taken. Social networking updates from mobile devices can be geotagged automatically now, and many mobile services can respond to geolocative data.

Web services are beginning to make use of geolocative data in creative and useful ways. Radar (http://outside.in/radar) serves up local information like news, blog posts, restaurant reviews, and so on, based on a viewer’s location. The service can determine a computer’s location automatically based on IP address (if the user permits), allowing travellers to instantly get local information on their laptops wherever they may be. Buzzd (http://buzzd.com) is a city guide and social networking tool for mobile devices, including not only local information but also user ratings and tips. These relatively simple applications of geolocative data represent its earliest uses in websites and mobiles, and we can expect further development soon.

Similarly, the mapping of geolocative data is not new; but the ability to easily create map mashups online using multimedia and geotagged data is. Now that geolocative data are becoming easy to capture and apply as tag data, we are beginning to see applications for research and learning that are quick and inexpensive but still very effective. Google Maps (http://maps.google.com) offers a one-click way to overlay public, geotagged media onto the relevant section of a map as you view it; simply click the “more” button in the upper right of the map. Choose photos or videos, and they will fall into place on the map. With Flickr Maps (http://www.flickr.com/map), viewers can see at a glance what tags are currently being uploaded in a given region, or find locations in Australia where photographs of kookaburras were taken (mostly around the southern and eastern coasts, incidentally) by searching on those terms.

“Hyperlocal” information — minute details about a specific location in the form of everyday photographs, blog entries, and video clips — offers opportunities for research that were previously only available by actually living in the location in question. Geotagging these items facilitates searching and finding pertinent information for a given place and enables web services to pull in local information from a wider variety of sources. As it becomes easier to capture geolocative data, more media will be geotagged, increasing the availability of hyperlocal information.

Not all cameras, phones, and other devices have geolocative capability yet. In the meantime, a number of free or very low-cost tools to capture and display ATP Electronics (http://www.atpinc.com/newweb/p2-4a.php?sn=00000257) is one example; it captures GPS data and synchronizes it to a camera’s data card to geotag the photos automatically. Another approach is to use something like the GPS Trackstick (http:// www.gpstrackstick.com), a small device that can be carried in a pocket or glove box. It records the path it travels, and the data can be uploaded to create custom maps.

Naturally, the easy availability of geolocative data raises questions about privacy and personal safety. As it becomes easier to gather, display, and use geolocative data, common sense must dictate how much information to share — and when and where to share it.

Relevance for Teaching, Learning, and Creative Expression

Geolocation has obvious application for research in a wide range of disciplines. It opens up opportunities for learning and data acquisition in the field for the sciences, social observation studies, medicine and health, cultural studies, architecture, and other areas. Researchers can study migrations of animals, birds, and insects or track the spread of epidemics using data from a multitude of personal devices uploaded as geotagged photographs, videos, or other media plotted on readily-available maps. Research material can be gleaned from everyday media uploaded by the millions of people using geo-aware cameras and recording devices, creating an ever-updating library of material online.

Existing collections of geolocative data are also becoming more accessible as the tools to search, organize, filter, and display such data become more sophisticated, easier to access, and simpler to use. The array of emerging web applications that can combine topographical data with geotagged media and information are at the heart of geolocation’s importance to educational practice. Combined with free datasets like Geobase (http://geobase.ca/geobase/en/), a Canadian database of geospatial information, web applications can be used to produce custom visualizations layered over detailed maps or 3-D landscapes using real-world data.

Mobile learners can receive context-relevant information about nearby resources, points of interest, historical sites, and peers seamlessly, connecting all this with online information for just-in-time learning. Social networking tools for handheld and mobile devices or laptop computers can already suggest people or places that are nearby, or show media related to one’s location. Mobile Twitter clients like Trak (http://www.trak.fr/site/en/) and Twinkle (http:// tapulous.com/twinkle/) add the user’s location to tweets, indicate nearby friends, and show messages tweeted in the user’s vicinity. Collage (http://tapulous.com/collage/), a photo application for the iPhone, lets the viewer upload geotagged photos, browse photos taken nearby, and see photos as they are taken all over the world. Mobile Fotos (http://xk72.com/mobilefotos/) is another iPhone application that automatically geotags photos taken on the device before uploading them to Flickr. The technology to capture and use geolocative data in user-friendly ways on mobile devices is just beginning to hit the mainstream, and we can expect to see tremendous development in this area in the coming months.

A sampling of geolocation applications across disciplines includes the following:

• Geosciences Geolocation can be used to map the locations of key geological features or to plot mineral occurrences over large regions. Similarly, geotagged photographs of important outcrops found in Flickr can be easily mapped to give a visual overview of where they are located.
• Urban Planning Geolocative data can be applied to track and map commuter patterns or movements of pedestrians over time to improve the design and efficiency of urban transit systems.
• Lifelong Learning Mobile devices that are location-aware can supply information related to monuments, museums, civic centres, libraries, and other public buildings that are nearby. geolocative data are available. The Photo Finder by Travellers can easily find performances or exhibitions that are currently underway in any city they visit.

Examples of Geolocation

The following links provide examples of applications of geolocation.

A Collaborative Map of Modernism in Australia
http://www.cityofsound.com/blog/2008/09/a-collaborative.html
This map displays the locations of modernist architecture across Australia, with links and images. It was developed after the author visited and critiqued the Modern Times exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum as a way of extending the reach of the exhibition across Australia.

CommunityWalk
http://www.communitywalk.com/
CommunityWalk is a tool that provides a way to create and annotate custom maps with geotagged data and photographs uploaded or pulled from Flickr.

‘Flickr Bikes’ Photo-Map Locations Across the Globe
http://www.lifehacker.com.au/tips/2008/09/16/flickr_bikes_photomap_locales_across_the_ globe-2.html
As part of their “Purple Pedals” campaign, Yahoo shipped bikes outfitted with solar-powered camera phones to riders all over the world. As the bicycle moves, the camera takes a photo every 60 seconds, automatically geotagging and uploading each one to Flickr.

Introducing Geode
http://labs.mozilla.com/2008/10/introducing-geode/
In the near future, web browsers will have the ability to supply location information (if the user permits it) to websites that request it. An early instance of this technology, Mozilla’s Geode, is an experimental add-on to Firefox 3 that allows developers and users to assess some of the possibilities of location-aware websites.

Locative Media: Eyes on the Prize
http://www.locative-media.org/projects/C82/
When the civil rights documentary Eyes on the Prize was re-released in the U.S., a public television network partnered with an Oakland, California high school to create a social justice project in which students documented social justice issues in their community, geotagged the events, and created a digital story and interactive map of their neighbourhood.

MIT’s Senseable City Project
http://senseable.mit.edu
The Senseable City project at MIT seeks to create meaning, and art, from geolocative data.

Radar
http://outside.in/radar
Radar is a web service that provides local information, including news, restaurant reviews, blog postings, and the like. Radar can now accept geolocative data directly from the web browser, providing location-aware information to users without requiring the user to type in an address.

For Further Reading

The following articles and resources are recommended for those who wish to learn more about geolocation.

GeoPodcasting — Adding Location to Audio
http://www.randomconnections.com/?Fp?D1158 (Tom, Random Connections, 1 November 2007.) This post describes ways to geotag audio material like podcasts.

Geotag Your Digital Photos
http://www.macworld.com/article/135225/2008/10/geotagging.html
(Ben Long, Macworld.com, 3 October 2008.) This article describes several ways to geotag photographs, how to view and share them, and useful tools.

Guardian.co.uk Gets Maps
http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/insideguardian/2008/oct/09/1
(Paul Carvill, Inside Guardian.co.uk Blog, 9 October 2008.) This article describes how the Guardian.co.uk website implemented and used geolocation and maps to enhance articles submitted by journalists on the road.

How Your Location-Aware iPhone Will Change Your Life
http://lifehacker.com/395171/how-your-location+aware-iphone-will-change-your-life
(Adam Pash, Lifehacker, 5 June 2008.) The iPhone’s location-aware features enhance a host of applications from social networking tools to geotagging photos taken by the phone to nearby restaurant recommendations.

Location Technologies Primer
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/06/04/location-technologies-primer/
(Eric Carr, TechCrunch, 4 June 2008.) This article explains the technologies that are used for location-awareness applications.

What’s the Best Web Site for Geotagged Photos? http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-9847536-2.html
(Stephen Shankland, CNET News, 10 January 2008.) This article compares a variety of websites that allow users to geotag their photographs.

del.icio.us: Geolocation
http://del.icio.us/tag/hzau08+geolocation (Australia–New Zealand Horizon Advisory Board and Friends, 2008.) Follow this link to find resources tagged for this topic and this edition of the Horizon Report, including the ones listed here. To add to this list, simply tag resources with “hzau08” and “geolocation” when you save them to del.icio.us.

Related Tags: geotagging, maps