Location

Sharing Your Location Automatically

Submitted by jesse on Sat, 08/07/2010 - 23:00

As smart phones explode in popularity they are prompting the development of new kinds of social media services, notably "location-based services" that reward people for actively sharing their physical locations, a process called "checking in". Now a new wave of similar services will accomplish this automatically, with little or no input from us. Does this demonstrate our newfound comfort with surveillance, and are we getting enough in exchange for the privacy we're discarding?

Briefly, location-based social media services are a rapidly emerging kind of application largely driven by smart phones. The use of these apps on smart phones helps connect the web to the physical world: the stores, places, and communities around us. Some of these services are game-like, such as Foursquare and Gowalla. Others are tied into review sites like Yelp, or map services like Google Buzz, Places, and Maps. Twitter and Facebook are also actively getting into the location-based services game, adapting their services and apps to take advantage of the world around you and help you connect not only with friends, but the places and business that are nearby.

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The Buzz Nearby: Why You May Never Be Much Of A Mayor On Foursquare

Submitted by jesse on Thu, 03/25/2010 - 11:40

via flickr.com

A rapid convergence is taking place between the web and reality. The artificial division between the virtual and the real is starting to dissolve, as various applications and technologies combine to stitch together interfaces and activities that together dissolve the barriers between the web and our material world.

Augmented Reality is a vivid depiction of how this may manifest a few months from now, however in the present, services like Foursquare, Gowalla, and Google Buzz are helping to make it a reality. In contrast to AR, which I suspect most people still find a bit terrifying, the current batch of location based services have basic interfaces, usually connected to maps, which we're all relatively familiar with.

In fact there's something kind of seductive to using maps as an interface to this emerging convergent world where our location and surroundings are rich with information and social ties.

Is it an indication that we're lost and looking to find our way? Or the inverse, that we know where we are, and we wish everyone else to know as well?

The motivations for using social media and sharing one's location are not always as obvious as they may seem. Critics often slip into absolute terms when assessing how location based services can and will be used, however to fully understand their impact and potential, it is important to immerse oneself in the experience.

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