Location-Based Services, Proximity-Based Notification & actuation, Real-Time Locating Systems, Geosocial Networking, & Telecommunication Convergence

Anyone want to add to this list of current fascinations? I've begun making lists of keywords, not necessarily of popular keywords such as words used in search queries, but more like stuff that is current, phenomena we'll say that are in their infancy.

I wanted to write a blog about the above themes, but haven't been able to put them all together. I am a sound designer so I have a huge investment in all things related to the words Ambient or Ambience.. So as soon as "Ambient Intelligence" and "Ambient Computing" appeared as researchable terms, I came across them.. Same thing with Ambient Media & Systems, terms like that..

I'm interested these days by the rise of the Mobile Web and Mobile Social Networks.. everything mobile intrigues me, maybe because I'm seeing it from the perspective of an outsider, NOT having my own mobile phone..

It's as though the web got really, really big, the horizon was far, far away, it was a Brave New World.. then it's the Mobile Web all of a sudden and people are using Proximity Tools to check out what's going on around them, people are using smartphones & related technologies to walk around in an Augmented Reality.. I mean we've gone way beyond just Google Maps.. there's a huge telecommunication convergence going on.. and soon Geosocial Networking will be a thing of the past, or a "household term", at the very least.

I was thinking and our information needs have changed. Now we want answers in Real-Time and we want answers about Local things, events, products & services, etc. It's not enough to be moving in a "wireless communication ambience", but we want to see EVERY BIT OF CONTENT that fits into that wireless com. ambience..

I like it because the Mobile Web is very much about the Here and Now. It's more and more about how much the apples are going for at the supermarket, rather than about what's going on in Poland (say, for Americans with no Polish ancestry, Poland would be an "exotic" far away place..)

Proximity-based notification = you get a ping every time soda pop goes on sale at the supermarket or jockey shorts go on sale at Wal-Mart..

Proximity-based actuation = your mobile phone unlocks the front door when you begin to walk up the steps leading to your apartment.

People are less concerned about the RANKING of their website with regards to Google's PageRank algorithm.. Now we can about our "social ranking", we are looking for "social votes" by way of collaborative filtering or social bookmarking.. We are really experiencing something beautiful and mind-altering when you sit down and think of it.. groundbreaking genius, I call it..

Two makeshift terms to think of: "mobile computing proxemics" & "augmented social empathy"..

It is largely about RELEVANCE.. you'll see that RELEVANCE is going to be a key word for a long time now..