LocalRec 2018 workshop report the second ACM SIGSPATIAL workshop on recommendations for location-based services and social networks^* Seattle, Washington, USA - November 6, 2018

Driven by technological advances in hardware (positioning systems, environmental sensors), software (standards, tools, network services), and aided by various open movements (open, linked, government data) and the ever-growing mentality of sharing for the greater good (crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, collaborative and volunteered geographic information), the amount of available geo-referenced data has seen dramatic explosion over the past few years. Human activities generate data and traces that are now often transparently annotated with location and contextual information. At the same time, it has become easier than ever to collect and combine rich and diverse information about locations. Exploiting this torrent of geo-referenced data provides a tremendous potential to materially improve existing and offer novel types of recommendation services, with clear benefits in many domains, including social networks, marketing, and tourism.