Alive with movement and excitement, cities transmit a rapid flow of exchange facilitated by a meshwork of infrastructure connections. In this environment, the Internet has advanced to become the prime communication medium, creating a vibrant and increasingly researched field of study in urban informatics.

The Handbook of Research on Urban Informatics: The Practice and Promise of the Real-Time City brings together an international selection of 66 esteemed scholars presenting their research and development on urban technology, digital cities, locative media, and mobile and wireless applications. A truly global resource, this one-of-a-kind reference collection contains significant and timely research covering a diverse range of current issues in the urban informatics field, making it an essential addition to technology and social science collections in academic libraries that will benefit scholars and practitioners in an array of fields ranging from computer science to urban studies.

Coverage:

The many academic areas covered in this publication include, but are not limited to:

Community Engagement
Digital cities
Digital Identity
Environmental Impact
Locative Media
Mobile and wireless applications
Participatory planning
Privacy
Surveillance
Sustainability
Urban Informatics
Urban technology

Reviews & Statements

This book exposes research accounts which seek to convey an appreciation for local differences, for the empowerment of people and for the human-centred design of urban technology.

– Marcus Foth, Queensland University of Technology, Australia

With its authoritative coverage of an important, cutting-edge topic in computer science and information technology management, this book is essential to academic libraries in the U.S. and abroad and is also suitable for advanced undergraduate or graduate-students.

– SirReadaLot.org (January 2009)

Urban Informatics is a magnificent volume drawing together 29 essays exploring themes and territories such as: participation and deliberation; engaging urban communities; location, navigation and space; wireless and mobile culture; and urban futures. As a handbook for research, the essays emphasize research methodology, particularly those wrought of collaborative and transdisiplinary work.

– Linda Carroli, Urbanista, Arts Hub (January 2009)

This work brings together an international selection of 66 scholars presenting their research on urban technology, digital cities, locative media, and mobile and wireless applications.

– Book News Inc. (February 2009)

It's an edited volume as thick as a fist, packed with essays that when taken altogether give a great overview of this exciting new interdisciplinary field of research and design practices.

– Martijn de Waal, The Mobile City Weblog

Kudos to my local university library for ordering a book that I have been waiting for for quite some time.

– Kwende Kefentse

As a showcase of academic creativity applied to problems of real (or virtual) place-based information, this book is certainly worthy of attention.

– Ezra Haber Glenn, ACIP, MIT Lecturer, USA

In summary, in the book Foth pulls together a diverse literature of ICTs, and addresses how they are used throughout the world. The chapters range from critical reflections on who is using the technology and how, to more technical applications. The chapters are mostly well written and referenced... It does provide a useful resource for social and computer scientists.

– Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design

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Editor/Author Biographies

Marcus Foth is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Creative Industries and Innovation, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Australia. He received a BCompSc(Hon) from Furtwangen University, Germany, a BMultimedia from Griffith University, Australia and an MA and PhD in digital media and urban sociology from QUT. Marcus is the recipient of an Australian Postdoctoral Fellowship supported under the Australian Research Council’s Discovery funding scheme and a 2007 Visiting Fellowship from the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, UK. Marcus’ work is positioned at the intersection of people, place and technology with a focus on urban informatics, locative media and mobile applications. His research has significantly shaped the social strategies of the Kelvin Grove Urban Village, the Queensland Government’s flagship urban renewal project. Employing human-centred and participatory design methods, Marcus and his team pioneer new interactive social networking systems informed by community, social and urban studies.

Since 2003, Marcus has (co-)authored over 50 publications. The high quality of his research output has attracted over $1.16M in national competitive grants from the Australian Research Council and industry in 2006 and 2007. He is a chief investigator on the projects New Media in the Urban Village: Mapping Communicative Ecologies & Socio-Economic Innovation in Emerging Inner-City Residential Developments, and Remembering the Past, Imagining the Future: Embedding Narrative and New Media in Urban Planning. He is lead chief investigator of Opportunities of Media and Communication Technology to Support Social Networks of Urban Residents in Mexico, South Africa, UK and Australia, and Swarms in Urban Villages: New Media Design to Augment Social Networks of Residents in Inner-City Developments. He is a member of the Australian Computer Society and the Executive Committee of the Association of Internet Researchers.

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Editorial Advisory Board

Genevieve Bell, Intel Corporation, USA

Roger Burrows, University of York, UK

Paul Dourish, University of California, Irvine, USA

Eric Paulos, Intel Research Berkeley, USA

Anthony Townsend, Institute for the Future, USA