I’m a huge fan of the augmented reality (AR) concept and the potential it provides.  With devices becoming more powerful and the technology in place to make it a reality, AR is at the forefront of mobile possibilities.

A shining example of which is a new startup called “Tagwhat,” which made its public debut today to offer what’s its calling “a new augmented reality (AR) experience that fuses the very best of mobile, augmented reality, and location-based social networking services for everyday use and appeal.”

At it’s core, Tagwhat is a fully functional social network, layered on top of the physical world and accessed by “tags” through an innovative augmented reality experience.  By simply holding up the camera view of a mobile device (iPhone or Android), geo-contextual tags from pre-selected friends and community members become visible.

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NearVerse, makers of an innovative proximity-based content delivery platform, today announced it’s raised $1M in seed funding for it’s unique LoKast mobile social networking iPhone app.

LoKast is a welcomed innovation in the world of mobile social networking, focusing more on content sharing rather than staying in touch with friends on the go.  What interesting is that it’s based on NearVerse’s proximity-based architecture, which allows for content transfer between users even without network connectivity.

LoKast, which is short for “local-casting” allows users to setup a profile that lists photos, selected contacts, videos, web links, music and more which is then made available to other LoKast users within close proximity of each other, or within 300 feet roughly.

The company is also planning to launch an Android app, integrate Facebook Connect and is in the process of securing partnerships to make more content available to its users.  The app has a lot of potential, and it’s an interesting take on mobile social networking.