G2G: LOCATION-AWARE MOBILE SOCIAL NETWORKING WITH APPLICATIONS IN PERSONALIZED RECOMMENDER SYSTEMS
Keywords:
Wireless computing, Mobile Social Networking, Location-based ServicesAbstract
We present G2G, a proximity-aware social networking platform for Mobile Information Device (MID) users and its applications in personalized travel assistance via location-aware recommender systems. User proximity to a friend or a place or event is determined via GSM cell information and enhanced via GPS information if the mobile device has such capability. GSM cell information alone is greatly enhanced through the concept of user-defined “hotspots” which is the means that allows the system to expand the notion of proximity to include not only users covered by the same GSM cell but also users and/or hotspots covered by geographically neighboring cells. The system can be thought of as a Selective Dissemination of Information platform where users subscribe to it and are willing to receive selectively information coming from their own personal network of friends and acquaintances, and if they opt for, from other system users as well, in the form of location-aware notes about nearby places. G2G continuously and actively disseminates to users information relevant to their current location within a user-defined radius. This information is published into the system by the users themselves who can recommend a place or event. To bootstrap the system with sufficient content however that makes the use of the system appealing to users, we have developed Web Information Extraction methods that extract relevant data from web pages that contain recommendations about public places and/or events that can be geo-located using publicly available GIS services such as Google Earth APIs. Regarding its Social Networking aspects, the system allows users to see nearby friends and chat with them, as well as block selected friends from seeing them. The system also acts as a personalized tourist guide providing visitors of outdoors cultural heritage sites multimedia presentations about the site on the spot.
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