Two mobile apps for navigating the city in two very different ways:
Embark – maps plus some more hand-holding (i.e. alerts, underground access)
Via Laughing Squid
Serendipitor – maps plus simple instructions to follow along the way — for the more whimsical commuter
Grow Interactive worked with Google to concept and develop Uncover Your World, a lovely mobile experience for Google’s Search App.
To build the ad experience, Grow modeled an entire “world” with 3D technology and used a 3D printer to bring it to life. Check out the making-of video below:
You can explore the mobile site here: http://www.uncoveryourworld.com/
Contributed by Mia Ruiz-Escoto
Satisfy your craving for mystery and intrigue mixed into daily routine with Gumshoe:
110 Stories imposes an outline view of the Twin Towers on the NYC skyline using augmented reality.
Based on your location, the app offers a glimpse back of how the towers figured into the cityscape from multiple vantage points. The app also encourages people to comment and share their memories and impressions of the augmented skyline.
The project, from artist Brian August, reached its goal on Kickstarter just in time for the 10 year anniversary of 9/11.
Read more about it here: http://kck.st/nIyEjN
Challenge your friends to a virtual race around the world with this clever Facebook app. An advergame for Mini France, MINI Maps lets you design your own racing vehicle and then zoom through life-like cities thanks to satellite images from Google maps.
Via Digital Buzz
What do you get when you combine the mystical World of Warcraft with Foursquare?
World of Fourcraft uses the Google maps API and Foursquare to transform New York into a huge, WOW-inspired, multi-player strategy game fueled by check-ins. New Yorkers: declare your allegiance to a borough today!
As it’s well-put by Mashable, “the nerdverse might just explode.”
Via Mashable
Twitter recently published two incredible data visualization videos showing the links between outgoing and incoming tweets from Japan following the March 11 earthquake. It’s a great example of how digital tools enable us all to communicate world wide.
From twitter’s blog:
“On Twitter, we saw a 500 percent increase in Tweets from Japan as people reached out to friends, family and loved ones in the moments after the earthquake. The video below shows the volume of @replies traveling into and out of Japan in a one-hour period just before and then after the earthquake. Replies directed to users in Japan are shown in pink; messages directed at others from Japan are shown in yellow.”
Check it out here
Toronto Tourism has created a “cheating wall” where visitors can see via video screens into Montreal, and vice versa.
Equipped with video and audio, it’s a live portal enabling people to even chat with their counterparts in the other city.
Living Social is on the verge of launching Living Social Instant. Business owners can set up deals on the fly and offer them to people nearby that moment.
http://www.businessinsider.com/tim-oshaughnessy-livingsocial-instant-2011-5
So cool. Select the continents that you might want to see, hit Teleport, and you’re immediately in the middle of nowhere, Africa, or in a random location in Japan.
http://web.mit.edu/~jmcmicha/www/globegenie/
Contributed by Justin Visser