locativemedia

features of locative media

people used as processors (as in .walk, where the users "calculate" the urban space as though they were a "peripatetic computer)
real space can be marked and demarcated invisibly; physical space becomes annotated; the 'story' of history can become present in a site w/ out physically altering the site.
typified over last 5 years by GPS enabled PDA; increasingly switching to smartphones/ iPhone.
offers "a conceptual framework by which to examine the certain technological assemblages and their potential social impacts" (http://networkedpublics.org/locative_media/beyond_locative_media --the Net Publics? project at USC).
Bruce Sperling's suggestion (in "Shaping Things") that the "internet of things" might be effectively détourned to bring more awareness of the ecological role of objects is implicitly present in locative media projects--though rarely is it explicitly palpable in the ways that the Social Price Tracker begins to suggest.

Examples of successful/applicable locative media projects:

MILK project
center for locative media in San Francisco; brings together Bay Area locative media projects with an aim of social good.
Happy Cow and Veg Out iPhone Application comes from Eric Brent, a UC Santa Cruz alumni and founder the Happy Cow, who helped create an iPhone application called Veg Out which is an equivalent of locative media. The fixed location to restaurants and its dependence on free labor brings awareness to new restaurants, health food stores or markets. The distribution of materials for consumption will grow with participation like Yelp. The network in which users are active and want to be active will allow the network to grow. The iPhone application is located here

Useful links/ texts:

essay from Netpublics that usefully fleshes out locative media in terms of both theory and practice, circa 2006.
rhizome is a sort of clearing house of locative media and digital arts projects. We (theoretically) have "institutional access" via the University, though whenever I try to access it that way I get a 404 not found...

Primary links