Is Pokemon GO Educational?Pokemon GO debuted this past week in the U.S. New Zealand and Australia. The goal, using the augmented reality app on the phone, is to visit locations and catch the pocket monsters from the 1980s card game. The game is from Niantic, a Google spinoff, which debuted Ingress, back in 2012. Data collected by those who played Ingress power Pokemon GO.
Gavin Shrock, editor of xyHt suggests the game may be a significant geospatial education opportunity. "Something like the shared experience of this kind of activity would make a great ice-breaker and provide a common frame of reference from which to explain how asset mapping and hunting for survey markers works – many of the same elements are there in this little app."