Supporting social networks by event-driven mobile notification services

Abstract

Mobile terminals, e.g. mobile telephones, make a silent shift in our information access paradigm. While sitting in front of computer screen we are likely to follow a traditional client-pull path to find what we need. Mobile users, in general, are not keen on typing queries on small keyboard and read comprehensive reports on mini screens. The mobile users, want the system to inform them when something important has happened or is going on. Following the mobile users' expectations information services should offer event driven instant messaging available in subscription mode. However, many of events happening around us involve and affect more than one person and are interesting not only to an individual but to a group or community. Such a group sharing the same or overlapping notifications create a natural social network. In this paper there is a discussion of application architecture and functionality issues of mobile notification services in the light of its social implications. The background for discussion is composed of currently developing applications e.g. virtual obituary notice and mobile price comparison service. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.