Patent ID: 7840224

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for providing functionality based on location-based virtual groups of users of mobile devices, the method comprising: creating multiple temporary location-based virtual groups of users of mobile devices, the creating of the multiple temporary location-based virtual groups being performed by one or more programmed computing systems and including, for each of the virtual groups, receiving information from a user to define the virtual group, the received information including an anchor point with a geographic location around which a geographic area of the virtual group is centered, termination criteria indicating when the temporary virtual group will end, and user interaction rules that specify types of actions that users who are part of the virtual group may take; receiving requests from multiple users to join the virtual group, each of the users having a mobile communication-capable device that provides information regarding a current geographic location of the user; and for each of the received requests from the multiple users, determining whether to admit the user to the virtual group based at least in part on the current geographic location of the user being within the geographic area of the virtual group; and for each of the created virtual groups of users, automatically providing functionality to the users of the virtual group in accordance with the user interaction rules of the virtual group based at least in part on enabling communications between the mobile communication-capable devices of the users of the virtual group, the automatic providing of the functionality to the users of each of the created virtual groups being performed by at least one of the one or more programmed computing systems.