Location-based services are supposedly the next big thing (if not ‘the’ big thing currently). The premise is that you ‘chek-in’ when you get somewhere, telling various groups of people where you are. The original intent, at least for Foursquare, was for barhoppers and party-goers to be able to easily find their friends. When you’re out on the town, you could check-in at a bar and instantly do two things – tell your friends where you’re at (so they can meet up with you) and find out which of your friends might already be there.
That’s great if you’re out on the town frequently, but what if you’re not? Or, what if none of your local buddies think checking in is as cool as you do? Well, in those situations, it turns out to be kind of pointless. I’ve been using Foursquare for over a year – I have spent 178 nights out, and checked in a total of 346 times. I (currently) have 4 mayorships and 10 badges, so I’ve been using it as much as I can (which is the point of the service, anyways).
However, I’m not getting any value out of it, so I’m quitting. What’s Value? Value will be defined differently by different people. One way that a location-based service would add value is the obvious – make it easier for me to find and meetup with my real friends. While that’s specifically what Foursquare is designed for, it doesn’t work for me – I don’t go out often enough and most of my ‘real-life’ friends aren’t using Foursquare. Thus, it’s not helping me find my friends – in fact, I can’t think of a single instance where I was able to use Foursquare to find or meetup with my friends.
I would also count it as ‘adding value’ if my check-ins generated conversation online. I realize that’s a stretch, but let’s be honest – bloggers have egos, and whenever someone interacts with us online, either with a comment or a ‘like’, it’s like getting a treat. Just to be clear, this isn’t really specific to Foursquare, that’s just the service that I’ve been using. Gowalla is a similar one, as is the new Facebook Places and Ovi’s new Check-In service.
What do you think of the various check-in services? Have you ever used them to actually meet up with your friends? Have you gotten any actual real value out of them (aside from stickers/badges and mayorships)?
On a side note, Foursquare’s account deletion page is freakin awesome. See a screenshot below:
Ricky Cadden 
I find Gowalla and Foursquare to be a bit silly in a fun way. I do find both to be very useful at conferences, specifically SXSW, were I may want to find certain sets of friends that I have not yet had time to hang out with or just plain catch up with.
But during the rest of the year, it does feel a bit like checking in to the void.
funny enough I was thinking about 4sq this morning and here comes my description of the service 🙂
A human using 4sq is like a dog pissing to a lamp post. Marking territory and claiming “I have been here” 🙂 Now why humans need to publicize “this act” to twitter and facebook is beyond my understanding
Andre
funny enough I was thinking about 4sq this morning and here comes my description of the service 🙂
A human using 4sq is like a dog pissing to a lamp post. Marking territory and claiming “I have been here” 🙂 Now why humans need to publicize “this act” to twitter and facebook is beyond my understanding
Andre
I like the geo context it adds to tweets and updates … I also like the social tracking ability of friends which is the real purpose. There’s some very interesting marketing opportunities developing as an added bonus … that’s me.
yeah, I mean, I can definitely see where it would add value to different people – the younger crowd who is always out and about, or places like San Francisco where you’re much more likely to ‘bump’ into someone (by checking into the same place as them).
Perhaps I’ll revisit in a year or so and see if any of my local establishments have added some sort of a discount or something. The only one I’ve seen is Starbucks, and I don’t drink Frappucino’s.
I like the geo context it adds to tweets and updates … I also like the social tracking ability of friends which is the real purpose. There’s some very interesting marketing opportunities developing as an added bonus … that’s me.
This exit message would break me into staying. I’m rubbish at breakups…
This exit message would break me into staying. I’m rubbish at breakups…
Confession: I didn’t actually delete my account, I just uninstalled it from my Nexus One.