youtube
Linkedin
twitter
Facebook
What Will Geolocation Do?August 19, 2010 – 6:00 pm |
 Abdul Fattah Ismail |
|||
The launch of Facebook Places application brings a cornucopia of themes to the table. Foursquare has seemingly taken an earnest stance with Facebook’s geolocation initiative, as seen in this video with Holger Leudorf, the Foursquare Vice President of Mobile and Partnerships.
Competition is healthy within any marketplace, as the crux of free market capitalism. Privately, I wonder about the start-ups’ true thoughts. Foursquare has done a solid job of leveraging partnerships with Starbucks, for example, into a multi-pronged channel that delivers advertising and brand equity amongst a loyal base. They have also been a hit with local restaurants and retailers by providing an analytic dashboard to track customer data and grant mayor medallions for repeated visits.
Nevertheless, I think that reality will surface to the top. Facebook has become the behemoth of social networking, and they want more. Their partnership with Bing to gain market share in search indexing, along with its leveraging of user profile data to tailor campaign strategies, can offer credibility to geolocation that eludes Foursquare at this moment in time. In fact, it could pose a threat to Craigslist by carving out target demographics.
Places will allow novice users to manage their accounts through one interface, and Facebook wants to be the final destination for your interactive experience. In today’s deluge of information, an option of efficient streamlining is gladly taken. The odds are that Foursquare can survive for a little while longer with hardcore loyalists, but reports are surfacing that some Foursquare users are already migrating to Facebook Places.
Places can take Facebook deeper into a dimension of privacy debate. Users have deactivated accounts this year after heavy criticism of protocol negligence. It can be difficult to remember the level of information placed on your user profile, and the inclusion of geo-location magnifies the potential for risk amongst those sharing their points on Earth. The downfall of MySpace was more than just a hackneyed design scheme. Cases of pedophilia and other malicious acts popped up in several states, damaging the website’s integrity amongst the public.
Everything intensifies when information is shared through mobile devices, which already have automated GPS systems through carrier networks. Surely, one must exhibit prudence when combining too much information through various user interfaces. I doubt that Carmen Sandiego would love geolocation. She couldn’t steal treasures and teach geography to children if they already knew her whereabouts. Serendipity is fun sometimes. Geolocation kills it for me. Sorry, Facebook.
One Response to “What Will Geolocation Do?”
I’m with you Abdul.
I’ve never understood the allure of telling everyone on Facebook that you’ve just dropped Jamba Juice. Who cares?
Now if you dropped in and met Lady Gaga in line and you snapped a pic with her kissing you on the cheek, then I might care. And I wouldn’t mind at all seeing that update show up in my news feed.
But a stupid picture of a grid, showing what nail salon you’re at… super, super… super not interested.
And I’m not their customer. Evidently people like this idea and if there’s a way to monetize it, why not go for it. There must be something to it for Facebook to want to add it to their services which helps them become even more of a Universal Remote Control to their fans.
We’ll see how it all pans out.
By Note Taking Nerd #2 on Aug 19, 2010