Digital and Societal Transformation ideas-expertise-proces

Layar , a quickly evolving and much hyped augmented reality browser has anounced a new version with the inclusion of 3D objects viewable within your smartphone on location. Check it out.

Christian De Backer is CIO of TOMTOM. He has been nominated as CIO of the year and in its interview (dutch) some interesting elements can be found. Evolution to real-time maps (instead of now 3 months) Importance of user generated content

The new ODOS newsletter is out from Routeyou

Waze, a free provider of driver-generated maps and real-time road information, announced a new version of its free navigation app to include fun gaming elements in addition to smart algorithms, so that waze maps all over the world are updated even quicker. The consumer application is available on the Apple AppStore and the Android Market Place and can be downloaded from the waze web site for Symbian and Windows Mobile devices. The new version adds more capabilities to waze's already popular 'munching' game that encourages users to validate road driving directions as they drive around. The game will now be upgraded to munch `road goodies' - cherries, hammers and small gift packages worth bonus points - that will be placed in areas where the waze system has identified map problems. The highest scoring `road goodies' will be placed in locations with the most severe map issues, and as users drive around to munch these `goodies', waze's system will utilize the dr...

The announcement of a GPS pack included in the next Android 2.0 (product from Google) has created the stockmarket to dump shares of companies like Tomtom. Having gone through the demo of this Google GPS pack, I have following comments for discussion: + Over the air (off-board) - "free" is quite relative if you have to access the info through mobile data: mobile data packs for connectivity to the cloud are not 'free or unlimited' in my first trial of nav4 free application, a 10 km drive through Brussels did cost me 11 Euros:); alternative networks like wifi are not really of use when on the move; - the Google GPS software is thus a competitor for the applications on smartphones that take maps and info over the air; Nokia provides free mapping services, with a premium for voice guided traffic; a real free GPS over the air service is NAV4all , already existing a few years now, with good maps, speed traffic information, etc... - battery life: wonder if you will be able...

Google is taking a shortcut in navigatin, especially in US, where it is relying on its own maps, own user data etc, eclipsing the Teleatlas etc of this world. The following youtube trailer is explaining some of this:

Identifying people, objects and data by their geographical location has always been crucial, though it has provided limited commercial value. However, the rapid evolution and commoditisation of the communication services technologies has led the way to the development of this activity as a business opportunity. One way to identify the data and objects by their physical location is by geotagging them - the process of adding geographical identification metadata to various media such as photographs, video, websites, RDF or RSS feeds and is a form of geospatial metadata.

(source press release) Tele Atlas Global Digital Map Database Delivers 1.25 Million Edits Sourced from Community Input More than 116,000 Kilometers of Road Geometry in the US and 25,000 Kilometers in Germany Validated and Realigned, Road Networks of Ireland and Turkey Further Defined Gent, Belgium, 28 September 2009 – Tele Atlas, a leading global provider of digital maps and dynamic content for navigation and location based solutions, today released MultiNet® 2009.09, which includes 1.25 million validated edits sourced from community input from more than 30 countries. With this significant volume of community input incorporated, Tele Atlas continues to set the standard for accurate maps, dynamic content and routing intelligence that power the world’s leading location-based applications. MultiNet is the only digital map database that is constantly validated by the tens of millions of consumers who use it. The latest release of the database includes edits sourced from community input acr...

Wired Journalist Bruce Sterling keynote on the history on "augmented reality" Video: Bruce Sterling's Keynote - At the Dawn of the Augmented Reality Industry from Maarten Lens-FitzGerald on Vimeo . comment: typical American way of presention

Brightkite and Layer browser make a comment of a restaurant appear in front of this restaurant... Brightkite Augmented Reality from Brightkite on Vimeo .

This video show another standalone augmented reality application

Check out this video and see how geographically enhanced information can change your view of the world. This Layar system provides business-layers, one could imagine easily user generated information.

Now Twitter wants to know where you live Shared via AddThis

Nice video of how maps are actually done by Teleatlas (Ghent- Belgium) Embedded video from CNN Video

Bhuvan portal has been launched in India it is a geoportal of Indian Space Research Organisation showcasing Indian Imaging Capabilities in Multi-sensor, Multi-platform and Multi-temporal domain. The portal gives a gateway to explore and discover virtual earth in 3D space with specific emphasis on Indian region. In journalist terms it was coined as an Indian version of Google earth.

Google foundation has initiated a grant system for better and more usefull mapapplications: http://www.google.org/geochallenge.html

Personally I don't like the wordk neo-geography; indeed what is once new becomes old the next day. Think about new-age, new-beat,... Wikkipedia has a definition list of neo-geography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neogeography

Following links are interesting summerreading: If you don't know where to go in one week, Vancouver is the place at the Geowebconference: http://geowebconference.org/press-media/2009-blog/ Usability and the Geoweb, check out this blog: http://briannoyle.wordpress.com/ Location based services blog: http://bdnooz.com/ And start with creating your own touristic route at http://www.routeyou.com/ or get out there in real-world and enjoy!

crosspost from Geocouching journ al; Geocoaching is going mainstream with a Hollywood movie devoted to this GPS game trend. Enjoy!

Planning a city trip requires a lot of preparation: gather touristic information, selecting the most appropriate attractions and events, determining the best sequence of visiting taking into account opening hours and locations, etc. This is often a difficult and time consuming task. The ‘Citytrip Planner’ simplifies this process. On July, 7, the Flemish “Art cities” (Antwerp, Bruges, Ghent, Leuven en Mechlin), together with the Centre for Industrial Management of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, the research unit IT of KaHo Sint-Lieven Ghent and the company RouteYou from Ghent, launched the ‘Citytrip Planner’. This unique web site presents a personal city trip, fast and efficiently. How does it work? First, you enter some trip data (date of the trip, number of days, starting and ending point, start and end time, etc. ) and you answer some short questions to determine your interest profile. The Citytrip Planner immediately proposes a trip taking into account your interests, the trip ...

Google labs has come out with a tourist city planner . I was excied to chedch it out. Well this application for sure pales with the Ghent based routeyou one in terms of feasibility and export functions. Wondering how to create a g reat city architecture walk in Brussels of Benjamin de Lestré de Fabribeckers , my grand-grandfather and contemporary of Victor Horta.

Mobile Mash-up Mobile Monday Brussels community The Mobile Monday community gathers live in Brussels on Monday April 20th. Exchange your views on mobile mash-up with the following speakers: Android Mobile Mash-up and Life Folder application in a technical perspective Friedger Müfke - OpenIntents Location Based Mash-ups in a marketing perspective Johan Lemmens - Service2Media Eurostar Girlygeekshopping Mash-up case Flickr, Twitter and Google Maps Caroline Maerten - Rolling Talks Customer engagement in a mobile world Jürgen Coetsiers - the creative stores Discuss afterwards whilst having a drink thanks to location sponsor the creative stores Free entrance www.mobilemonday.be to register for this event. Location : Diamant Center, Bd. A. Reyers 80 - 1030 Brussels map and details on www.diamant.be

NTT Docomolabs Europe is launching in betatest a mobile life mobile blog. Test out yourself at http://www.iyouit.eu Instalaltion went smooth, and interaction with GPS receiver and camera as well; in my profile I lkike the 'mood factor' and the fact that i can add moods, etc... the mapfunction is quite precise and intergrated with Nokia maps (share of POs) I wallked in and out of a restaurant at the end of my street; still wondering about usefullness...

The spyware WaledPak-E uses your computer/mobile phone IP adress to provide a localised verison of a 'breaking story' news, tailored to your city. When clicking on the videolink the spymalware starts (source sophos)

My friend Rudi from m-trends has put up a list of predictions about mobile, and one of them is about location that will disappear. Indeed, just like time has disappeared because of its omni-presence, internet connectivity disappeared because of its omni-presence, so will location awareness do: it is something embedded that provides a value add-on, but in itself does not bring much value. I believe Rudi is right at some point, although I see still some more area of growth, more at least than the Swiss watch industry related to time.