Another LBSZone Alert has been released... enjoy this edition for the latest developments in Location-based services with news and updates from Where2.0

Hello from the Spatial Media LBSzone... On the heels of another Where2.0 I'm left with a stack of notes from seminars, power sessions, meetings, and application demos. The annual gathering of Geo-technology professionals and neo-Geographers has concluded and several topics of interest have jumped out at me once again. Clearly, social networking, location provisioning, privacy, the mobile web and business models (or lack-thereof) are important topics left to ponder. The crowd of some 500 (my best guess) location-savvy professionals digested some interesting information and were left wondering where do we go from here. My take from Where is that the Map has evolved to a natural user interface, just look at Google Maps who just this week have incorporated more local content into the Google Map (and Earth) environment, making gmap the natural bookmark for many of us for search, rather than the google.com root page. We saw cool, new apps (or should I say developer platform) like LightPole, which does an amazing job at mobilizing Platial and other local content (akin to Widsets but much more, making the map and location the focus). then there's Fire Eagle from Yahoo! For developers, this is huge... Fire Eagle shares your location information with services and applications that you choose. This location information is obtained from the web or your mobile device - already, developers are running to Fire Eagle to make location-provisioning part of their service. But, like Where2.0's of the past, most people were left wondering, "Where's the money in it"? Indeed a fair question. Advertising within mashups, map services, and other location-aware applications is a hot topic and usually results in lively discussion. Heck, even developers like Adrian Holovaty (founder of EveryBlock) admit that no business model is yet in place - yikes! On the upside though, it seems that mobile advertising is up and coming, to date resulting in much better results than online ads while providing coupons and useful information to users in a timely manner and more important, WHERE people need them. Have you used a mobile coupon lately? I have... please share your thoughts with me and Remember, it's Cool to know where you are! More notes from Where2.0 on the AnyGeo blog and some pics are now up on the Flickr - with much more to come! [Send your comments, announcements, tips, tricks, gripes, or kudos to Glenn or simply contact ]

 

See http://www.lbszone.com/newsletter/may152008.html