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Experiments in moblogging

Noel Jenkins — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 22:22:33 +0000

I’m having a break from this blog for a few days while I investigate the potential of moblogging for geography fieldwork.

I have set up a sandbox moblog here, and I’m using a Blogger site to post about my progress. When you think about it, the ability to travel somewhere, take a picture and write a few words, then in seconds, publish on the internet is pretty amazing. Well it is to me anyway!

Goodbye Geobloggers, Hello Yuan.CC Maps

Noel Jenkins — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 19:45:53 +0000

Sadly, Geobloggers is no more according to Ogle Earth. Perhaps, as someone has hopefully suggested on the Flickr forums, the Geobloggers code could be open-sourced. For those not aware, Geobloggers was a visionary application that located Flickr photos in Google Maps, and later in Google Earth too.

My favourite free alternative to Geobloggers was the GMiF Fire Fox extension which embeds Google Maps into Flickr. I welcome the latest development: Yuan. CC Maps. My geotagged Flickr photographs have a new home! It’s a really simple application that works beautifully, though not with Google Earth (yet?).
Yuan.CC Maps looks like this: (quite a big file)

In the meantime Itag offers a way to conveniently tag a location to Flickr photos, and by adding the FlickrFly script, the photgraph is viewable in Google Earth.

ITag

Noel Jenkins — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 20:10:35 +0000

Thanks to Ogle Earth for this post about a new tool for Google Earth.
ITag is a free application that lets you add locational information to your photographs using Google Earth.

Simply drag pictures into the application’s main window and geocode them by dropping a Google Earth placemark over them. It’s remarkably quick and simple, and there is the option to add the Flickr Fly script that I’ve previously mentioned, so that once the photograph is posted to Flickr, it’s possible to open it up directly in Google Earth from within Flickr.

This file can be shared easily, and an example is posted below:

download .kmz file Saunton Evening

edited 22/8/08

Yellow Arrow

Noel Jenkins — Sun, 29 Jan 2006 22:55:32 +0000

Since moving away from London, I’d forgottten about the Yellow Arrow project. Although the concept was born in 2004, it is still very much part of the zeitgeist, and a recent investigation into Semipedia see post, together with my impending smart phone purchase (this week!) prompted a quick post.
Yellow Arrow describes itself as a “Massively Authored Artistic Production” or MAAP, according to the website. It’s a spatial anotation project, the aim being to tag features of interest with a yellow arrow sticker bearing a unique code. When someone finds the arrow, they text the code and receive back a message, about that location. In some cities, the yellow arrows form an unconventional tour through parts of the landscape that would be hidden from non-locals – creating a geographical adventure by text.

photo by Stillben
Potentially, Yellow Arrow would make a unique local study. Where would students place the arrows? What would the messages be?

A subversive, graffitti-based local place study, linking the virtual and human environment? It really sounds like my next fieldwork project! No seriously…

Semapedia

Noel Jenkins — Tue, 24 Jan 2006 18:29:31 +0000

I’m rapidly talking myself into getting a smartphone. Not just for the live GPS tracking (see previous post), but because of concepts like Semapedia. In essence, Semapedia is about tagging real world locations with internet-based information, via a mobile phone. This could be a great (and highly subversive) fieldwork activity. Ogle Earth has posted an interesting article about Semapedia, together with a link to a Google Earth file for viewing some of the recently tagged locations.

I’ve printed out my first Semapedia tags – can you guess where they are going?

update 29/1/06 – I’ve just addded my first Semipedia tagged image to Flickr. The image is also tagged with the Flickr Fly script – see this page for more details