Wednesday 17 August 2011

The Importance of Location

When conducting research into location based technologies and their place within society, I came across The Mobile City, who are a group interested in the interaction between digital media technologies and urban design. In particular Michiel de Lange's paper on Moving Circles:Mobile Media and Playful Identities caught my attention. I think his explanation of the five typologies of Locative Media clearly breaks down the categories of current location based technologies:


  1. Wayfinding: Cartography - e.g. Google Maps, etc.
  2. Sensing & Visualization: Non-visual information displayed cartographically - e.g. Air Traffic Movements, Travel Patterns, etc.
  3. Annotation: e.g. Geotagging, Augmented Reality
  4. Social Networking: Locative media for social purposes - e.g. Foursquare
  5. Pervasive Gaming: Locative media for gaming purposes - e.g. GPS based game Tourality

It strikes me that these types can then be translated through to the mapping of Parkour.


  1. Wayfinding can map (generally only in 2D) the route of a Traceur; 
  2. Sensing & Visualisation could add information to this mapping (who is it, their vertical height, etc.); 
  3. Annotation could add verbal/visual geotags of the movements the Traceur is making; 
  4. Social Networking could highlight the Traceurs activities to a specified social audience; and 
  5. Pervasive Gaming increases the 'challenge' nature and the story of the mapping.


I would like to find out the following:
Which locative media type is used the most at present?
How can each locative media type be translated into an interaction relative to Parkour?
Is there a desire, from the Traceurs, for links to be made between their practice, digital location technologies and the urban environment?

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