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Intro -- Location-Based Social Media -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- 1 Introduction -- 1.1 The Development of LBSN -- 1.2 Location-Based Social Media in Our Own Words -- 2 Space -- 2.1 Spatiality Isn't Just Lines on Paper… -- 2.2 Research on LBSN and Spatiality -- 2.3 The Importance of Embodiment -- 2.4 Extraordinary Ordinary Places (and Spaces) -- 2.5 Different Games and Different Routes -- 2.6 Bragging, Social Bonds and Social Spaces -- 2.7 Physical, Digital and Playful Spaces -- 3 Time -- 3.1 The Digital Memory Lane -- 3.2 The Recording of and Replaying of Space and Location -- 3.3 Auto-Recall: The Recall of Location through LBSN -- 3.4 The Locational Past and Its Present Potential -- 3.5 'Time Waits for no LBSN…' -- 4 Identity -- 4.1 Social Networking Sites: Space, Place and Identity -- 4.2 'I am, where I am' -- 4.3 The Spatial Self Isn't Always, well, Spatial -- 4.4 Local Search and Feeling 'Local' -- 4.5 Foursquare and the Spatial Self it Configures -- 5 Conclusions -- 5.1 Summary of the Research -- 5.2 The Role of LBSN in the World -- 5.3 Zombie Media -- 5.4 In Closing… -- References -- Index.

Locative Social Media offers a critical analysis of the effect of using locative social media on the perceptions and phenomenal experience of lived in spaces and places. It includes a comprehensive overview of the historical development of traditional mapping and global positioning technology to smartphone-based application services that incorporate social networking features as a series of modes of understanding place. Drawing on users accounts of the location-based social network Foursquare, a digital post-phenomenology of place is developed to explain how place is mediated in the digital age. This draws upon both the phenomenology of Martin Heidegger and post-phenomenology to encompass the materiality and computationality of the smartphone. The functioning and surfacing of place by the device and application, along with the orientation of the user, allows for a particular experiencing of place when using locative social media termed attunement, in contrast to an instrumentalist conception of place.

Introduction -- A (brief) history of understanding space and place -- The phenomenology of place -- The mobile device as a thing: the gathering of place digitally -- Sharing location with locative social media -- The social capital of locative social media -- Conclusions

Through an investigation of patterns of use of the location-based social network Foursquare derived from an extensive ethnographic survey of users, this paper focuses on the orientation of users towards location-based social media and mobile computational devices. Utilising Heidegger's notions of mood and attunement to the world, the paper argues that the towards-which of the user, that is the mood of the user in a phenomenological sense, is critical to their experience of using location-based social media and the revealing of place that emerges from that usage. A contrast between a technological and a poetic or computational revealing of place can then be established based on the phenomenological orientation of user to device, application and world. The emphasis on orientation and attunement has implications for application design and research on user experience.

During the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic many governments imposed forced lockdowns and implemented social distancing measures. At the same time there was also a large increase in gaming sales, which was particularly pronounced in the Virtual Reality (VR) sector of the market. We hypothesize that this is no coincidence since VR immersion and the capability of inducing embodiment and a feeling of presence can mitigate the loss of contact with outside world. VR has social and spatial potential to provide space and place for human interactions in time when physical contracts are restricted. To investigate this, we analyse reviews of VRChat (a social VR game) posted on the Steam platform, both before and during the pandemic. Among several themes that were identified, we found indications that spatiality plays an important role in the players' experience. Users describe virtual worlds of the game using emotional language that suggest bonding and presence of place attachment. In the reviews made during the pandemic there is a strong theme of safety associated with virtual places of VRChat – a replacement of physical space that is no longer accessible or is perceived as unsafe. At least for some users, VRChat has provided a sympathetic and comfortable environment during the pandemic to act as a surrogate for social interaction during social distancing and isolation. Future interviews with users are needed to extend and validate this preliminary research.

Pokémon Go is a hugely popular hybrid reality game (HRG) that enables players to occupy a space that is simultaneously physical and digital. The general aim of Pokémon Go is to discover and then capture Pokémon. This article reports on an original research project designed to explore the impact of Pokémon Go on spatiality and sociability. The project was conducted between May 2017 and July 2017, using an online survey which received 375 responses from users of Pokémon Go geographically spread across the globe. Drawing on the concept of the "playeur" as an established approach to understanding the effects of locative play on spatiality and sociability, this research follows three lines of enquiry. First, the research examines whether the intermingling of play and ordinary life might encourage players to spend more time outside in public spaces, and how this mode of play is experienced. Second, the research explores whether the game mechanics of Pokémon Go might lead players to traverse their environment using modified routes, as well as to frequent new places. Third, the research examines whether the praxis of Pokémon Go might enable new forms of sociability to emerge that extend beyond earlier HRGs.

While the metaverse is often marketed as a future utopia, the vision of the metaverse represents an attempt for private corporations to control the code of the real. In the hands of companies that established and maintain the surveillance capitalism model, the ability to build a persistent, all-compassing environment means all activity in that world can be metricized and commodified, making the metaverse worthy of critical examination. Significant parts of life are already conducted in a digital place that combines various aspects of digital culture. Likewise, digital worlds for socializing already exist, and in a form akin to the VR metaverse, just as VR worlds based on play now coexist with online worlds of user generated content. These discreet private "microverses", as we refer to them, are spaces which can model the tensions that would be inherent in the metaverse. From Microverse to Metaverse: Modelling the Future through Today's Virtual Worlds examines the place attachments, world-feeling and dwelling of several "microverses" to assess the possibilities of the metaverse as a realistic proposition. Critically analyzing the phenomenological feeling of place, the political economy of emerging tech, the mechanisms of identity and self along with the behavioral constraints involved, the authors map what a metaverse might be like, whether it can happen, and just why some companies seem so determined to make it happen.

"In cities around the world, digital technologies are utilized to manage city services and infrastructures, govern urban life, solve urban issues, and to drive local and regional economies. While "smart city" advocates are keen to promote the benefits of smart urbanism - increased efficiency, sustainability, resilience, competitiveness, safety and security - critics point to the negative effects, such as the production of technocratic governance, the corporatisation of urban services, technological lock-ins, privacy harms, and vulnerability to cyberattack. This book, through a range of international case studies, suggests social, political and practical interventions that would enable more equitable and just smart cities, reaping the benefits of smart city initiatives while minimizing some of their perils. Included are case studies from Ireland, the United States of America, Colombia, The Netherlands, Singapore, India and the United Kingdom. These essays discuss a range of issues including political economy, citizenship, standards, testbedding, urban regeneration, ethics, surveillance, privacy and cybersecurity. This book will be of interest to urban policymakers, as well as researchers in Regional Studies and Urban Planning"--

This book uses an international perspective and draws on a wide range of new conceptual and empirical material to examine the sources of conflict and cooperation within the different landscapes of knowledge that are driving contemporary urban change. Based on the premise that historically established systems of regulation and control are being subject to unprecedented pressures, scholars critically reflect on the changing role of planning and governance in sustainable urban development, looking at how a shift in power relations between expert and local cultures in western planning processes has blurred the traditional boundaries between public, private and voluntary sectors