Automated determination of mobile user locations and notifications of social media member events
A method, system, and/or apparatus for automatically tracking a mobile user using the user's mobile device. This invention is particularly useful in the field of social media, such as for detecting and tracking the location and activity of a user and her community. The method or implementing software application uses or relies upon location information available on the mobile device from any source, such as cell phone usage and/or other device applications. The social media system can automatically determine a location type and/or user activity from context information. The context information can include current and past location and user and/or community information, time-dependent information, and third party information. The automated location and context information allows for users to set triggering conditions for other users, such as to provide an alert to one user or more users upon a particular action of the monitored other user being automatically determined by the system.
1. A method of determining locations and/or activities of users participating in a social networking service, the method executed by a computer system and comprising:
automatically determining a positional destination of a first user, wherein automatically determining the positional destination of the first user comprises:
providing a location module on a mobile device configured to receive location transmissions;
placing the location module into a sleep mode;
awakening the location module upon receipt of a first location transmission; and
determining a first location with the location module
incrementing a timer count configured to monitor a duration of time, wherein whenever a time exceeds a predetermined time allocation, the location module is placed into the sleep mode;
incrementing a stationary counter configured to monitor a duration of time since a previous detected movement of the first user;
receiving a second location transmission of a second location;
comparing the second location to the first location;
calculating a rate of travel when the second location differs from the first location, wherein if the rate of travel exceeds a predetermined threshold the location module is placed into the sleep mode;
receiving a third location transmission of a third location;
comparing the third location to at least one of the first location or the second location;
further incrementing the stationary counter when the second or third location is the same as the first location;
determining an arrival event upon reaching a predetermined arrival threshold of the stationary counter;
storing data of all locations; and
placing the location module into the sleep mode;
receiving a triggering condition from a second user through a second user electronic device;
automatically monitoring for the triggering condition within the social networking service;
automatically communicating the occurrence of the triggering condition by the first user to the second user through the second user electronic device.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the triggering condition comprises the mobile device's proximity to, arrival at, or departure from, one of the locations.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the one of the locations is a specific location identified by the second user in the triggering condition.
4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the triggering condition is an activity or condition of the first user automatically determined using the second user electronic device.
5. The method of claim 4 , further comprising:
automatically determining a positional location of the first user;
automatically determining context information about the positional location without input by the first user;
automatically deducing as user information a location type and/or user activity of the positional location from the context information; and
automatically analyzing the user information for the occurrence of the triggering condition.
6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the communicating the occurrence comprises automatically providing a time and/or distance between the first user and the second user.
7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the triggering occurrence comprises the first user moving between locations.
8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the triggering condition is selected from automatically generated predetermined condition selections displayed in a user interface on the second user electronic device.
9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising tracking and updating a positional location of the mobile device upon the occurrence of the triggering condition.
10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising automatically and continually tracking locations of an electronic device of each member of a social media community of the second user.
11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising reducing possible location types and/or user activities as a function of the past location type and/or user activity of the positional destination for a given time period.