The Neighborhood Wide Web
As the total amount of data on the web increases (Google is currently
searching more than 8 billion web pages) regular search engines are
going to become increasingly useless. The number of results for the
small Texas town of Lufkin is 902,000.
In order to cope with the overwhelming amount of data available it is inevitable that the web will become more spatially-oriented. Associating location with data isn’t a difficult leap. It is not only currently happening but there is a growing amount of evidence to show that information with a spatial component is more desirable.
Social networking services are a good way of demonstrating my point. We’re all familiar with sites like Friendster which allow us to link up with friends via uniform profiles. Among my peers, Friendster was the most popular of these until The Facebook overtook them in a matter of weeks.
Why was one more successful than the other? There are two important factors to consider. First, my friends are mostly college students and the site is specifically designed to link up college students with one another. The second and more important reason is that the site is spatially-oriented.
Mark Zuckerberg, the sites creator, acknowledges the connection:
CM: Your website was one of the first social networking sites to explicitly ground its online community on a physical one.
MZ: That’s why I think the website has been such a success. We don’t view the site as an online community—we bill it as a directory that is reinforcing a physical community. What exists on the site is a mirror image of what exists in real life.
This isn't the only area of the web that is mirroring real life. Numerous articles on UC have noted how Google Maps and Flickr are connecting street addresses and location tags to search results and photos respectively.
The connection is spreading on the internet by category of usage and in reality hierarchically from larger urban areas to smaller ones. On the internet the first connections between location and data were customized home pages which presented local news, sports, and weather. The next step was the local information site which featured original content searchable by neighborhood. A good example of this is the citysearch site. This Boston Citysearch site features reviews of local restaurants, local events, and local shops. Now blogs have become more spatial with the popularity of the -ist sites. DCist is an example of a community-oriented blog that is showing up in more cities.
What the future brings is a connection between data and and an individual's location via portable devices. There is already a patent for this technology held by Peter Dana (a former professor of mine) and S. Hancock. The basic idea is that buildings, businesses, parks, and other physical structures will emit (over bluetooth, 802.11b, or new technologies) information that will be transmitted to your phone/computer.
Like the web itself, and spatially-oriented websites, this technology has spread and will continue to spread from larger cities to smaller ones. The expansion of wireless internet means that wired cities like Austin and much of the West Coast will see this technology first.
The local paper is currently beamed into our computers every morning. Why is it such a leap to expect that the daily specials will be beamed into our pockets as we walk by the local deli?
Wow -- delis hawking spam and roast turkey sandwiches via my phone/laptop/skull-embedded microchip and a refrigerator which nags me that it's empty and needs milk -- pinch me, am I dreaming?!
Posted by: curtis | 05/10/2005 at 19:12