Using Twitter to capture Mapping Application information

Twitter allows users to share short messages called Tweets.

A Tweet is limited to 140 characters - but can include a Photo, location or GPS coordinates if that information is available - making it the idea service for easily capturing Mapping information without the need to author Native mobile application.

Twitter provides Native Mobile applications that make use of Camera and GPS hardware across different mobile devices (iPhone, Android, BlackBerry) which can be leveraged from capturing mapping information.

Transcript

1. Using Twitter on Mobile Devices to capture information for Mapping Applications What is Twitter? Twitter allows users to share short messages called Tweets. A Tweet is limited to 140 characters - but can include a Photo, location or GPS coordinates if that information is available.
2. What are the benefits? - Twitter provides Native Mobile applications that make use of Camera and GPS hardware across different mobile devices (iPhone, Android, BlackBerry). - Already used by many people, access to social network and viral aspects of twitter. - Supports Photos, Locations and GPS coordinates where available. - Contributors can be identified and authenticated using their Twitter account. What are the Limitations? Using Twitter for capturing Mapping information: - Capturing information and displaying mapping information are separated. - Information is limited to 140 Characters. - Websites making use of Twitter information are limited to100 queries an hour. - Requires active internet connection. - Location and coordinate information may not be available based on position and services available (this is a general limitation to all GPS based applications).
3. From the Twitter perspective ... What are the requirements for capturing information? - A Twitter account. - Native twitter application installed on Mobile Device. - Internet connection. - Location services enabled on Mobile Device if Location is to be inferred. - Twitter Hash tag (#wildspots) in tweet to identify which Tweets should be used.
4. Tweeting a picture with GPS location on the iPhone:
5. Specifying a time GPS based location when available Quick tweet with short description Short description with notes Tweet details #wildspots Hash tag to identify Tweet to be mapped The text of the tweet can be captured in many different forms - this text is then processed and extracted by the Mapping Application
6. The information from Tweets: After making a few tweets - there is already valuable information that can be used.
7. Pulling the Twitter information into a Mapping Application By Finding all tweets that have been tagged with #wildspots we can then represent these on the map. The tweets have a Photo, GPS location as well as a short text part - with this basic information it is sufficient to build a map.