Google Maps: Misbehaving with UA Sniffing

Here's the TL;DR: Google Maps sniffs a browser's user agent string. If it finds Internet Explorer on Windows Phone, then it kicks it over to the m.google.com mobile home page.

So let's be clear. It's 2013 and one of the biggest companies on the internet is using a sniffer to redirect users on a browser and platform that it sees as competition.

Google's general claim is that the mobile version of Google Maps is optimized for WebKit browsers (such as Google Chrome) and therefore Google doesn't support non-WebKit browsers. Even though Google Maps works fine on Firefox mobile (which supports panning, but not pinch-to-zoom) and Opera Mobile (which sometimes supports panning, but not pinch-to-zoom), neither of which uses the Webkit engine. It even renders using Opera Mini, although I can't get it do anything. I can't test Internet Explorer on Windows Phone because I don't have it.

I can, however, test Google's browser sniffer by changing the user agent string in my browser to report itself as Windows Phone and watch my request for maps.google.com get redirected to m.google.com, the Google mobile home page. This tells me that Google isn't performing feature detection (such as touch events or multi-touch support), but is instead damning the browser by name alone.

This is the lesson Google is teaching young web developers who don't understand how flawed this approach is (contrary to its own instructions on best practices from less than a month ago). Google Maps happily lets me have a sub-par experience in Opera Mobile or Firefox mobile. It even lets me have a broken experience in Opera Mini. But Internet Explorer on Windows Phone? Google Maps just boots those users.

Reports I have read (and watched) on assorted articles online suggest that Google Maps works reasonably well on IE on Windows Phone (supporting panning and pinch-to-zoom). As such, I don't buy Google's argument that it wants to prevent users from having a poor experience—there is already evidence that a large number of users (more than use Windows Phone) are having a poor experience.

From Google:

The mobile web version of Google Maps is optimized for WebKit browsers such as Chrome and Safari. However, since Internet Explorer is not a WebKit browser, Windows Phone devices are not able to access Google Maps for the mobile web.

…Because we actively block them, should be how that quote ended.

So why is Google really doing this? Is it because it's fun to pick on Microsoft? Is it because Google thought it could get away with it? Is it to make the Windows Phone experience less appealing than Android's? Is it because Google doesn't like Microsoft's touch events specification (and how well it's been received) at the W3C? Is it because of recent court cases between Google and Microsoft?

In this case I don't much care. I care instead about the terrible example Google is setting for web developers.

Background

• Google Maps Has Never Been Accessible On Internet Explorer Mobile Now Blocked on Windows Phone (Updated), January 4, 2013.


• Now Google is blocking Windows Phones from accessing maps.google.com, January 4, 2013.


• Many Windows Phone users report being cut off from Google Maps (update), January 4, 2013.



• Google Maps never supported Internet Explorer on Windows Phone 8, and it likely never will, January 5, 2013.


• Shenanigans: Google Maps redirect issue on Windows Phones is a matter of competition, not compatibility, January 5, 2013.


• This is Why You Can't Access Google Maps on Windows Phone, January 5, 2013.



• Google Admits It Was Deliberately Blocking Windows Phone Users From Google Maps, January 6, 2013.


• Google says Maps redirect on Windows Phone was a product decision, and will be removed, January 6, 2013.


• Windows Phone Doesn't Support Google Maps Because Google Doesn't Want It To, January 6, 2013.



• Google Maps, Windows Phone, and an avoidable mess, January 7, 2013.

My Related Posts

• Let's Treat Old Browser Users Better, July 5, 2012.


• Another Anti-IE Gimmick, June 14, 2012.


• Exclusion Is a Feature Now, May 10, 2012.


• The Return of “Best Viewed in…”, March 4, 2012.


• Detecting Mobile Devices — Don't Bother, October 11, 2011.

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Is RSS at Risk?

I spent about a thousand words explaining RSS before I realized that, for the most part, if you are reading this blog I have to guess you have some familiarity with it (at least by just having heard of it). If you need some background, Wikipedia has a pretty good overview on RSS.

If you are a web site developer or author, there are three methods to get your Twitter feed or your Facebook business page information integrated into your site: via some sort of JavaScript-driven widget, via an API that is unique to each, or via RSS. This isn't limited to just Twitter and Facebook. PicPlz, Foursquare, and others provide these methods as well.

A JavaScript widget (whether via an embedded iframe or not) typically does not integrate well with a site, forcing the branding of the service, its color scheme, and its styles. For many sites, a Facebook widget or Twitter widget can look very out of place, almost like an afterthought. On top of this, because these widgets rely on JavaScript so heavily there is no alternative for those without JavaScript support (whether by choice, by restrictions, or by errors elsewhere on the page — see my post Beyond Hash-Bangs: Reliance on JavaScript Is a Bad Idea)

The API approach gets around styling issues, but often each API has its own proprietary offerings and syntax, requiring you as the developer to learn it, integrate it with your own platform, and spend time maintaining it as the API changes (possibly on a whim). While using this method you have control over how the data is styled on your site, relying on a free service means that you will have less input and recourse should a feature suddenly change (as I say, free doesn't mean good: You Get What You Pay For). Many APIs are reliant on JSON solutions as well, requiring JavaScript to perform the calls, and therefore the rendering, unless you are processing all of the features server-side.

The third method I mention, and the point of this post, is RSS. Because RSS has a standardized XML structure behind it (spread across parallel but unique versions, not counting variants like ATOM), as a developer you always know what to expect from an RSS feed. A JavaScript developer can just as easily parse the XML structure as a server-side coder. Once you have built a function to parse and display an RSS feed from one source, you can re-use it for any other RSS feed, forking it if you want to present the data in a different way on your site. This means you have complete control over the presentation (HTML, CSS and code structure).

In addition, most blog platforms (I'd say all, but someone might surprise me with one I don't know) not only provide RSS feeds of their data (and can even rely on a service like FeedBurner to provide additional RSS versions), they also support RSS import. This little feature means that if you provide content from your site as an RSS feed, any blogger can integrate it into his or her blog with only a few clicks.

An example of just how robust RSS can be is demonstrated with podcasts (and even vodcasts). The structure of a podcast file is really just an RSS feed with attachments, much like you might attach a file to an email. A regular RSS reader should be able to process the file, even if it cannot play the music. A podcast reader should, conversely, be able to read a standard RSS feed, even if there is no music to play.

Another powerful adaption is GeoRSS, which allows geographic data to be embedded in a feed. Syndicated content can be associated with locations on a map, something which has proven to be useful to the rise of location-based social media. For example, you can get your Foursquare history as an RSS feed, with each location tagged with geolocation data. In fact, a precursor to Foursquare, Brightkite, allowed users to generate custom RSS feeds to track specific spans of time, locations, groups of users, and even control how many items to display. When it came time for Brightkite to shutter its location-based services, it made all user data available to its users via RSS feeds.

Because of these reasons I have typically ignored hype expressing that RSS is on its way out. And then I stumbled across the post Twitter and Facebook Both Quietly Kill RSS, Completely, which was followed up a couple weeks later with Facebook Listens. RSS Added Back to Pages. Will Twitter be next?

This reminded me of an exchange I had on the Picplz API mailing list, where I asked if they would update the RSS they provided with geolocation data (since most photos are associated with a venue pulled from Foursquare). I was told that the RSS pre-dates the API and essentially that there aren't any changes in the pipe.

In just the last few days I have been struggling with the new MapQuest, trying to figure out how to embed GeoRSS in the new platform. In addition, I noticed that my "classic" MapQuest maps were no longer showing the embedded GeoRSS. After going through the support forum I found that GeoRSS is not (yet) supported in the new MapQuest, and nobody had noticed that it appears to be broken on the classic MapQuest (the solution they told me I should use for now).

So now I find myself wondering about the future of RSS. When Google Chrome doesn't even show an RSS icon or format it for display, when a new location-based service isn't adding the GeoRSS features, when a major mapping service doesn't support GeoRSS in its latest release, when Twitter buries the link for RSS, and when Facebook toys with its removal, I am concerned that they are contributing to the eventual demise of RSS.

I understand that content drivers (Twitter and Facebook) who survive on advertising revenues want to drive their brand and, ideally, their advertising to end users. Widgets that include a brand and drive people back to the advertising on the parent site make sense. For services and platforms (Picplz and MapQuest), pushing developers to a proprietary API increases the developers' investment in your platform, making it less likely for them to peel off when they can't simply apply their code to the next shiny new thing.

Unfortunately, these all combine to make the barrier to content syndication higher for everyone. While we can still wield an RSS parser to syndicate much of this content (often the one built into a blog, but typically a module within a CMS or other platform), it may be a matter of time before we lose the freedom to rapidly and repeatedly re-use a tool already in our belt. It may also be a matter of time before we as developers forget we should always build an RSS feed when we are instead enamored with the ability to claim our product or service has an API — even if it's not offering any more than an RSS feed can offer.

As developers we need to make sure we are helping our users, future developers, and ultimately our clients, by leveraging standardized tools. When it comes to content syndication and generally sharing data, RSS is the common denominator and typically worthy of implementation as the first step in a solution. If we aren't continuing to use it and expect it, the walled gardens and self-congratulatory APIs will catch up to us.

Related

• Rest in Peace, RSS, May 5, 2009.


• No, RSS Is Not Dead, and Neither Are RSS Readers, September 13, 2010.


• How to reboot RSS, September 13, 2010


• XML vs the Web, November 24, 2010.


• RSS Is Dying, and You Should Be Very Worried, January 3, 2011.


• Sure, RSS Is Dead — Just Like the Web Is Dead, January 4, 2011.


• What I mean by "the open web", January 04, 2011


• Why Big Media Wants to Kill RSS, and Why We Shouldn’t Let It, January 4, 2011.


• Blogging Forefather Seeks to Re-Invent Blogging, Again, January 5, 2011


• RSS: A Reply, January 14, 2011.


• Twitter and Facebook Both Quietly Kill RSS, Completely, May 8, 2011.


• Facebook Listens. RSS Added Back to Pages. Will Twitter be next? May 21, 2011.

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Color Has a Gray Pallor

Color is the newest social media application on the block, launched just after SxSW and relying on proximity-based media sharing instead of a friend model. Founded by names from other successful ventures along with $41 million in funding, Color seemed poised to storm the social media market.

One day after its launch, Color Labs, Inc. released an update to the Color app. Originally launched to support a 100 foot radius to find people for sharing, its new update was released to adjust that radius on the fly based on nearby activity. Considering the app is essentially useless without others who participate, this update is necessary to gain users (and necessary given it missed a great geek-dense SxSW event). When you read the opening statement in the product description in the Apple App Store and Android Marketplace, you can see that this need for others using the app nearby isn't exactly a surprise for Color:

WARNING: DON'T USE COLOR ALONE.

With so little activity visible to a user, users might look to the interface to provide some clues to using the app. After all, knowing if you are even using it correctly can manage your expectations one way or the other. Once installed, the app immediately asks for your first name, then prompts you for a photo of yourself, and then drops you right into its interface with some inexplicable icons (notwithstanding the tiny "Next" text-link-like buttons that move you along in the process). With no activity, it's hard to know what those icons do. This company-provided screen shot shows the app with its confounding icons in an ideally-active stream of content:

You might be motivated to look for a help screen in the application, but you'll have no luck. You might even be motivated to go to the Color web site to look for a tutorial or some form of documentation, but no luck. It turns out that there is a demo video available on Vimeo, but Color doesn't even link it from the site — you have to find it somewhere in the copious industry press coverage, which is something the typical user won't be doing.

When the Color Labs CEO says that the company is much more of a research company and a data mining company than a photo sharing site, it seems fair to question if the technology led the product rather than a tangible business model taking the lead. Given Color's reception so far, that seems like it may very well be the case.

In the Apple App Store product page for Color, the highest rated review of the product is really a parody, comparing it to a puzzle game (images of the full description):

You conquered Myst. You understood the end of Lost. You can do this! You're not going to let this new adventure game genre get the best of you! You will master this if it takes all weekend. You discover a button to create a group! You wonder what a group is. Progress, of sorts.

Given how easy it is to spoof GPS locations on a phone, even though the Color Labs CEO says that Color doesn't rely on GPS, it's a matter of time before a method to spoof locations is widespread. Let's not forget that Color is essentially anonymous, too, requiring no validation beyond location. It won't be long before you can expect to see Color turn into nothing more than a spam outlet or Chatroulette variant. I can assure you, I would not be letting my children (non-existent though they may be) install this app on their phones.

Related

• Color's Ambitious Photo App Seeks to Reinvent Mobile Social Networking


• Color CEO: The Tech Justifies the $41 Million


• Color to Get Major Update, Fix 'Loneliness' Problem


• PR Case Study: Where Color Went Wrong


• Color: Is it just the latest useless social media app?


• GPS check-ins taking off

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Brightkite Yields to Foursquare, Gowalla, Etc.

Brighkite has made an announcement today that affects me and a handful of other people (not counting all the people on Facebook whose timelines I inadvertently spam): Brightkite is dropping check-ins, posts and streams.

Brightkite started 3 years ago with a Twitter-like ability to share your random musings. However, it took the Twitter idea further and integrated built-in photo sharing and geolocation for each post. It was a while before Twitter even opted to offer location in tweets, and it still relies on third-party services to link photos. Brightkite also allowed for comments on posts and more robust friend (and fan) management. But being better or first didn't quite count (which reminds me, does anyone have a Betamax VCR I can borrow?). From Brightkite regarding place check-ins, photos, and user/place streams:

These features were the defining element to our company 2 and 3 years ago, but we no longer believe they are sufficiently unique or defining to be our focus, so we are dropping them.

Brightkite itself is not going away. It will focus on its group text feature, something for which I do not have any need. I did practically eulogize the loss of these features three months ago when Brightkite announced its first change in direction (Brightkite Changes Direction). I'll spare you the recap.

Others Starting to Offer Similar Features

This isn't the only change in the location-based social media space, however. The idea of attaching photos to places and not just tweets has been gaining traction. Last March, Gowalla offered the ability to attach photos to a place (The Location-Based Wars Rage On: Gowalla Adds Comments, Photos & More). Users checking in to a place can see images from other users or contribute their own. The interface for the mobile application is a bit clunky, and it's not a major feature of the service, but it re-creates some of what we saw in Brighkite.

Gowalla announced just a few days ago that it is going to integrate with Foursquare and Facebook places, allowing users to see their friends in one stream of activity. This is a converse of the single-point check-in service offered by Check.in, offered by Brighkite, that allows users to check in to Brighkite, Foursquare and Gowalla at once using some place matching tricks.

Just yesterday Mashable posted a theory that Foursquare is going to add photo sharing, based on a screen shot from a user and comments made by the Foursquare CEO about new features in the works. If Foursquare is really offering this feature, it essentially re-creates a core feature of Brigktkite. Whether it will offer a stream of photos with comments is anyone's guess. If it does pan out, it keeps Foursquare ahead of Gowalla, owing partly to Foursquare's Tips feature (Brightkite Photo Tips, anyone?).

Gowalla and Foursquare aren't the only players in the location-based world of photos. For those who know me, Foodspotting is right up my alley, allowing users to post food photos that are associated with food venues. SCVNGR also allows people to post photos with places as part of its overall game model, awarding points for the activity. There just isn't a good way to access those photos for users who are just checking in to a place to play the game. Facebook Places tries to offer some of these features, but it gets lost in the mountain of other things users can do on Facebook and certainly has its own batch of privacy issues beyond just giving up your location.

While users can now associate a tweet with a place and post a photo readily from their mobile phones, the existing photo sharing services don't provide a way to see all images associated with a place. That is why place-centric services are starting to see the value of relying on user-generated imagery to bolster their core offering — checking in to places. In the end, being able to see photos of food, the venue, the crowd, the lighting, specials, and the local drunk may be far more compelling reasons to use a check-in service than earning badges or pins.

That Brighkite is stepping away from this saddens me, but there are clearly going to be others offering at least some of those core features in the near future.

Related Articles:

• Thanksgiving and Social Media, Redux


• Brightkite Changes Direction


• Why We Check In: The Reasons People Use Location-Based Social Networks (my Brightkite use is referenced in the article)


• Securing Facebook Places (from Your Friends)


• Twitter Pushes into Places


• Travelogues, Places and Meetups


• Brightkite Tries Another Angle


• The Future of Check-ins at evolt.org


• Mapping Location-Based Social Media at evolt.org


• Real World Hyperlinks at evolt.org


• Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked)


• Enjoying Thanksgiving with Social Media


• We are thankful for... at the Brightkite blog

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Election Day Tools

If you are in the United States and not dead, it's kind of hard to miss all the chaos leading up to election day next week. Surprisingly, not a lot of people seem to know where their voting place is or even if they are registered to vote.

Conveniently, Google has made a gadget available for you to drop onto your site to help give people the kind of self-service they need. If you are a web builder (I assume that some of you reading this are), then you can customize the Google Election Center App and grab the code to drop it on your own site to help random voters (even if you are using a limited CMS, the code should still do the trick). As long as users enter a valid address (the example address above is a business address, so it won't return any results), they will see the polling place in Google Maps and directions to get there from the submitted address. In addition, a list of election candidates is provided (in random order).

If the app looks familiar, it's also living on the home page of the Voting Information Project, and the data it uses comes from that very organization.

As a little extra motivation to exercise a right guaranteed to you in the United States Constitution, for which so many have fought and/or died to retain and extend to all citizens, which makes you kind of an ungrateful jerk if you don't vote, Foursquare is offering badges for people who check in to polling places. Read up in this post on Mashable: This Year, Civic Participation Gets You an "I Voted" Foursquare Badge. On November 2 you can wander over to Foursquare's tracking page to see how people across the country are doing (provided they check in).

If you are still wondering who gets your vote and you are far too lazy to do your own research and track down your own unbiased resources, then a Mashable guest writer has provided 17 Web Resources to Help You Decide on Election Day. I suggest you don't wait until election day to decide.

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Location-Based SM Examples in the Real World (at evolt.org)

Whenever I speak about social media I usually field a few questions related to the location-based social media services. These include Foursquare, SCVNGR, Gowalla, Brightkite, Loopt, and now Facebook Places. The questions revolve around who is using them and why. While it's possible to see and explain the potential in these services, sometimes tangible examples are needed, and usually more than just explaining how awesome drink specials can be once you're the "mayor" of a venue. I wrote up some examples for evolt.org, and the article is now live on the site. The examples I use:

• The Ferris Bueller's Day Off Movie Experience


• NFL


• National Post at Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)


• Universities


• STD Testing

Of course, the day after I wrote this article, more stories came out about location-based services and real world applications, but I'll save those for a follow-up article. Now go read the article: Location-Based SM Examples in the Real World

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Brightkite Changes Direction

Brighkite has rolled out a new home page today, and for those of us familiar with its old home page, gone are the sample check-ins and photos from your area. Instead, the home page is pushing its group text feature.

In a blog post announcing the change, Brightkite acknowledges that the check-in has become a standard and expected feature of some services, and nearly all services are offering some sort of location tie-in.

Brightkite says it will focus on the following:

Improving mobile messaging

Text messaging hadn't altered for 20 years, but we've changed that. A principle focus is to push the boundaries of text messaging with groups, location, images and more.

Sharing location

Location is the foundation of Brightkite and remains a core focus. You will see location in everything we do — from product to local discounts and promotions. We allow you to share your location broadly to your social networks and with Group Text privately to a hand-picked group of friends.

Places

We will continue to ensure that we snap you to the right place — making sure that we have the broadest, most accurate selection of places and can propose the right place(s) based on your location and location history.

Brightkite also says it will now partner to provide these services:

Social graphs

We don't have ambitions to become the latest social graph. We believe that you carry around a great social graph in your pocket (your phone's contact list) and recognize that you've spent a lot of effort building out at least one other social network (for many of us this is Facebook). So, we wont require your friends to join Brightkite to use the service and we’ll leverage the networks of friends you’ve already built elsewhere.

Check-in

We pioneered the check-in several years ago, but as we've said believe it is now a commodity. Expect to see less and less emphasis on checking in on Brightkite, and associated streams of user content. Where appropriate, we'll support checking in to third party services like Facebook and Foursquare. This is an extension of the philosophy we started with check.in in the Spring. Keep a look out for some great new Brightkite features using the Facebook API for check-ins.

My primary use of Brightkite over the last two years has been to track my location through photos. The fact that Brightkite always did what Twitter does but also natively supported photos and location made it a natural choice as I bounced around the globe, tracking my journeys on maps in real-time for friends and family (ok, mostly just family). The fact that I could do it all from my sad little mobile phone via a mobile browser and email made it all the more appealing. Seeing comments on each photo from various people as I went, before I even had Facebook, made it somewhat interactive as well.

I've watched Brightkite try some new things, including the Brightkite Wall, Group Text, Photo Tips, Badges of their own, sponsored Badges, Check.in, and even augmented reality integration. I've also watched them struggle with spam, a highly problematic upgrade, and a drop in its user base (probably to other services).

Brightkite gives no indication that the core location-based photo service on which I rely is going away, but if or when that does, I will be sad to see it go. Thankfully I've done a good job of pulling the KML feeds of my trips to local files, along with the images. At least I wouldn't be losing anything I've done, just my ability to continue. And my friends would no longer be inundated with my food photos.

Related Articles:

• Why We Check In: The Reasons People Use Location-Based Social Networks (my Brightkite use is referenced in the article)


• Travelogues, Places and Meetups


• Brightkite Tries Another Angle


• The Future of Check-ins at evolt.org


• Mapping Location-Based Social Media at evolt.org


• Real World Hyperlinks at evolt.org


• Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked)


• Enjoying Thanksgiving with Social Media


• We are thankful for... at the Brightkite blog

Example Maps Fed from Brighkite

Pardon the constricted boxes, these maps look much better with a much wider layout than this blog template allows. Just drag around in the boxes to see more.

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Securing Facebook Places (from Your Friends)

Facebook Places is out. It's the Foursquare / Gowalla / Brightkite / Loopt / etc.-killer. Or so Facebook hopes. All of those services have some pretty clear controls in place to limit how much information you share. Granted, you can mess up even their simple privacy controls and share the address of your Mom's house with the town crazy (assuming he/she is technical enough to use the software, and cares), but at least the model is simple. Facebook, on the other hand, has gotten (earned) quite the reputation for having convoluted security screens that make it way to easy for the average user to expose more than intended. Facebook Places takes it a step further and can allow your own Facebook friends to announce your location to the world.

Instead of reformulating something I've already written (making smart choices about what you share from the physical world), I'll just link you there (Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked)) and instead outline how you can change the security settings in Facebook to protect your information. To be fair, Facebook just launched this feature yesterday, so you can expect it to change over time. You may want to review your security settings in Facebook on a regular basis.

There are two sets of instructions below, each with a set of screen shots. Make sure you go through both. Click the screen shots for the full size image.

Adjust Check-in Visibility, Disable "Friend Check-Ins" and "Here Now"

1. Choose Privacy Settings from the Account menu (upper right).


2. Choose Customize Settings.


3. Adjust Places I check in to what you prefer (I suggest no more than "Friends only").


4. Uncheck the box next to Include me in "People here now" after I check in.


5. Choose "Disabled" from the Friends can check me in to places menu.

Preventing Your Friends' Apps from Accessing Your Places Info

1. Choose Privacy Settings from the Account menu (upper right).


2. Choose Edit your settings from under the "Applications and websites" section on the bottom left.


3. Click the Edit settings button from the "Information accessible through your friends" section.


4. Uncheck Places I've visited.


5. Don't forget to Save Changes.

And with that you should be locked down. Remember, though, check it now and then. Make sure new items haven't been added or things haven't changed.

Related

• Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked) on this very blog.


• Facebook Places: Your Friends Are Here, But What About Your Privacy? from the ACLU.


• A Field Guide to Using Facebook Places at Mashable.


• Facebook Places Makes Location a Commodity at ReadWriteWeb.

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Travelogues, Places and Meetups

Today on ReadWriteWeb, Marshall Kirkpatrick (Co-Editor and Vice President of Content Development) has posted an article titled Why We Check In: The Reasons People Use Location Based Social Networks. In the article he explores why people use services like Foursquare and Gowalla to post their physical location for the world to see. Given that Facebook is planning to add location features and Twitter is pushing its own Twitter Places feature, this is a question many people ask — including those who use the services. As a regular user, I am often asked why and this time I had an opportunity to provide an answer for this article.

Marshall put the question out on the Twitters (yes, I am being ironical), and thanks to a retweet, it came my way. I responded with a couple tweets (below) about using Brightkite as my own travelogue. I thought what I was talking about was relatively unique. Apparently so did Marshall, because he comments on how many people made similar statements, about how they also used these services as some form of personal history.

My ego aside, which I suspect we all know is no small task, the article also discusses how the game nature of some services motivates people, while the human connection (almost forced serendipity) is a motivator for others. While the article isn't exactly scientific (at all), his polling certainly demonstrates some trends. Though there are no big surprises, the anecdotal examples are interesting.

Meanwhile, over at Mashable there is an article discussing Twitter Places, What Twitter Places Means for the Future of Location. You may recall me wondering how Twitter Places in its current form can really take over the world of location-social media in my post Twitter Pushes into Places. Mashable offers some reasons to ponder:

1. Location-Sharing to Become Mainstream
2. Boost Interest in Geo-location Apps
3. Promoted Places

In these examples, it's not that Twitter is going to take the lead, but instead that Twitter is simply going to use its "star power" to popularize and legitimize things we are already doing, or that other services are already doing.

While I've got you thinking about all these interesting bits related to location-based social media (we really need a simpler, universal name for that), take a look at this article from ReadWriteWeb: Is Geofencing the Next Evolution for Location Apps? Location Labs Thinks So. It essentially describes the thing I've always wanted Brightkite to do — notify me when I or a friend have entered some geographic area or zone and let us know each other is there. Certainly there is more to the service than this, but even if all you want is auto-checkins, then you may want to read this article.

If you've made it this far, then you may actually be interested in this stuff. If so, and you are interested in meeting people in your area who play and/or work in this space, Mashable is sponsoring a worldwide social media meetup on Wednesday, June 30. Many cities are getting in on the action. In fact, you could come to Buffalo and participate in our Mashable Meetup. If you don't, you'll be just like the other 6 billion people on the planet, and that's ok.

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Twitter Pushes into Places

Earlier this week Twitter announced Twitter Places, allowing users to associate tweets with specific places, not just latitude/longitude or data pushed in from other services (Twitter Places: More Context For Your Tweets). Up until this announcement, you could associate a tweet with a specific place by pushing a location with the tweet, as Brighkite does when it pushes an update to Twitter. Twitter even made best-guesses from your latitude/longitude to regions on a map (such as "central business district" or general community names). Now the Twitter web site and mobile site will support this feature so you don't need to rely on an additional application. The mobile applications, however, do not yet support it.

Twitter has said it is working on an API to allow developers to integrate Twitter places into their applications. In addition, even more browsers should support the ability to add your location to a tweet thanks to some partnerships with other providers. Twitter has also claimed Foursquare and Gowalla integration:

Foursquare and Gowalla integration: Many Foursquare and Gowalla users publish check-ins to Twitter. Location is a key component of these Tweets, so we worked closely with both companies to associate a Twitter Place with Tweets generated by these services. This means that if you click on a Twitter Place, such as "Ritual Roasters," you will see standard Tweets and check-ins from Foursquare and Gowalla.

When I bring up the "add your location" menu in Twitter to see my options for a place, my current venue (Algonquin Studios) is not in there. I know the venue exists in Foursquare, Gowalla and Brightkite, but it is not an option for me. I checked in to Algonquin Studios using Foursquare, Gowalla and Brightkite (just in case you need to somehow initialize a venue in your list of options) and have pushed tweets from Foursquare and Brightkite from this venue. But no luck, it still doesn't show up in the list.

Given that I already use location-based services to track my posts, there is nothing in the Twitter Places feature, as of yet, that will move me away from them. The fact that I cannot even select a valid location means I probably won't be trying this feature again for a while.

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Brightkite Tries Another Angle

Brightkite is working to be more relevant to the average web surfer using its image-happy almost-food-centric users by allowing them to post tips to venues (Tippety Top. Brighkite launches photo-tips). Oddly, as a Brightkite user, I first heard about this from Mashable (Brightkite Launches Location-Based Photo Tips), and then pestered Brighkite about this until it posted the announcement to the official blog hours later (I'm not implying that I caused Brightkite to post it, I am not that awesome).

Brightkite does not share venues with Foursquare or Gowalla, but thanks to its Check.in service, which allows you to check in to all three services at once, we know they are capable of matching places. Unfortunately, the new Photo Tips feature doesn't leverage the Check.in service (or its functionality), meaning it really won't lure users from Foursquare or Gowalla to use it in place of (or in addition to) their current check-in and tip-posting behavior on those services.

Looking through this new feature, I also cannot figure out how to turn old photos into tips, and while I asked Brightkite on its blog post and via the service (and Brightkite is usually rather responsive), I've heard nothing back yet. That means a couple years of tracking food at my favorite local Italian restaurant isn't being treated as a tip for that venue.

New photos can be updated and flagged as a tip right off the bat. Unfortunately, I use a Windows Mobile phone, where there is no Brightkite app, which means I have to email my photos into the service. Using this method, there is no way to flag a photo as a tip, making my first issue more important.

How this may integrate with services like Loopt, Foursquare, Gowalla and so on is anybody's guess. As a user, you really need to have some familiarity with the site to find tips, and there is no indication how they will make this repository available through Google or other similar search engines for users who have never heard of Brightkite. Interestingly, I currently add tips to a venue in Foursquare and add the URL of my Brightkite photo. It's not efficient, but it's some way to share the data. I will continue to use that method until I can see how this new feature will actually work.

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The Future of Check-ins (at evolt.org)

Last week Mashable featured a post asking if location-based services are all just hype. Continuing the geolocation theme Mashable has a new post, What the Future Holds for the Checkin, by a guest blogger/columnist. I have a reservations about how well this article delves into future opportunities, so I just toss a few out here.

Please header over to evolt.org to read my article, The Future of Check-ins. It will only be there for eternity, or until the world ends, so make sure you head over there soon. To make sure you see this link, I am repeating it:

Read The Future of Check-ins at evolt.org

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Too Much Hype over Location-Based Services?

Chris Treadaway is founder and CEO of Lasso, a "hyper-local advertising platform for media outlets and small businesses." He was recently on a panel in Austin, Texas with Gowalla CEO Josh Williams, where he may have seemed like a buzz kill to many in the crowd.

Chris tells his story in a post on Mashable titled Are Location-Based Services All Hype? As an avid user of Foursquare, Brightkite and to a lesser extent Gowalla (and the quasi-aggregator Check.in), you might be surprised to hear that I tend to agree. Not that the concept is hype, but that the potential for monetizing it is hype.

In his commentary he offers some metrics that we don't see today, but that can provide real-time (or near-real-time) feedback on how location-based applications are being used:

• Percent of Active Users: What is the percentage of users who have checked in during the last day? The last week? This will give us an indication of utility and/or fatigue.
• Revenue: Exactly how is all of this translating into revenue? For the LBS app companies? For brands that advertise? For local businesses?
• Average Number of Checkins Per Day: How often do people check in? Is this derivative metric improving or declining? This will tell us about the value proposition of checking in for the average consumer.
• Time Spent in Application: What is the average time spent per day inside the application per user? This informs the market about the experience consumers have with the application and how well it captures users' attention.
• Percent of Users Who Have Been Inactive Over the Last Month: How many people installed a location-based app but got tired of it and now no longer effectively use it?

While I don't agree with some of his assertions about what motivates people to use these services, the article is a good read from someone who is in the industry and trying to survive off it.

Related

• Mapping Location-Based Social Media (this article is also at evolt.org)
• Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked)

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Mapping Location-Based Social Media

If you have been paying any attention to the social media space for the last few years, then you've watched the rise in location-based social media. A few years ago Loopt and Brighkite offered the ability for users to check in to a physical location. Then came Google Latitude, Foursquare and Gowalla. Each one had its selling point — games, competition, badges, pins, notifying when your friends are near, creating a history of your travels, and so on.

Part of the appeal of these tools is seeing where you have been, almost like a travelogue for a person, as well as tracking others (friends or family). Brighkite, for example, has offered a GeoRSS/KML feed for some time that you can feed into Google Maps or MapQuest, or really anything that can read the geo-tagged posts. It has taken some time, but the rest of the web is finally catching up:

• Twitter is asking for your location, and displaying map links with tweets.
• Facebook has announced its intent to track location.
• Smart phone utilities are popping up to make it easier to track activity in a place.

Go ahead and read the rest of the article (and see the swanky screen shots) at evolt.org: Mapping Location-Based Social Media

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FourWhere: The Spawn of Google Maps and Foursquare

Both ReadWriteWeb (FourWhere Mashes Up Foursquare and Google Maps) and Mashable (Foursquare + Google Maps = FourWhere) are covering the emergence of a new service/site/product called FourWhere. The concept here is very simple — take Foursquare locations and feed them into Google Maps, providing a simple view of all the venues in an area.

Click for a larger view.

FourWhere takes it a little further, however, and allows you to filter venues so that you only see venues with tips. This is particularly handy to help filter out all the gas stations and office locations that I just don't care about. In addition, I can click on a venue to see all the tips/comments associated with it, making it much easier to make a decision about where I might want to go (or avoid).

Click for a larger view.

The site launched today and is running slowly, probably owing to a spike in traffic from the press it received and/or my browser's distaste for Java.

If you read my post Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked), then now might be a great time to make sure people aren't submitting your home address to Foursquare and leaving tips about your nice new TV.

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Don't Let Social Media Get You Robbed (or Stalked)

If you are one of the millions of people using social media to report where you are, you may have been tuned in to all the buzz lately about the site Please Rob Me. The concept is very simple, when you use applications like Gowalla, Foursquare, Brighkite, Loopt or anything else that broadcasts your location, you run the risk of telling the world that you aren't at home and it's ripe for the picking. You can compound it by advertising to potential stalkers (not much of an issue for me, but certainly if you're popular).

The geolocation features built into these applications not only tell people where you are, but if they have any familiarity with you, the area, or just spend a few minutes reading your history, they can pretty quickly posit for how long you will be away. This isn't limited to just geolocation-broadcasting services — you can just as easily use Twitter or Facebook (among others) to inadvertently tell people you are away from home or at a particular place.

That it took all the press around the Please Rob Me site to cause people to consider this is almost laughable. Granted, the site is pretty overt in how it conveniently aggregates all the data for visitors, but it's not doing anything that an interested party couldn't do on his or her own in a few minutes. All the site does is show all the Tweets from Foursquare users as they check in — not very complex. To quote from its Why page:

The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you're definitely not... home. So here we are; on one end we're leaving lights on when we're going on a holiday, and on the other we're telling everybody on the internet we're not home.

So how can you enjoy social media with geolocation features and still minimize your risk?

Techniques for Safe Check-ins

These are just three options. I employ each of these and find them fairly easy to follow. None of these will stop the old fashioned thief (who doesn't use social media), but they can make it a little harder for those casing you online.

Time Shift

Remember, you don't have to check in to a location as soon as you get there.

Let that sink in for a moment. I see people check in to locations as soon as they walk in the door, but they don't need to. Sure, you may not get the immediate benefit of knowing which of your friends might be nearby, but maybe you should sort that out in advance.

For example, I am known among my friends for posting photos of my meals through Brightkite. What many of them don't realize is that I often check in to a location after I have already left or (if it's near my house) as I am leaving. This has caused a couple awkward moments when a nearby friend is notified of my proximity and comes looking for me.

Hide Your Check-ins

Hide your check-ins from all but your trusted friends. And I don't mean those Facebook friends who you met once while in a mosh pit or that you haven't seen since second grade.

You don't need to Tweet to the entire world where you are. Sure, if it's a major event and you want to brag then go for it, but understand the risk. If you Tweet or check in for every morning visit to the local coffee hut, not only will people know where you are right now, you will be telling them where you are tomorrow or next week. Establishing a pattern of behavior makes it easy for someone to predict your moves.

Consider hiding your Foursquare check-ins and not Tweeting every one; you can still participate in the overall game. Lock down your Facebook profile from the general public. Consider disabling the geotagging from third-party applications that feed to Twitter.

Get a House Sitter

Some of you may be aware that I was just in Houston speaking at a conference. I was more than happy to post my progress via Foursquare check-ins, Brightkite photos, and an assault of Tweets. Anybody could have wandered over to my house for some pillaging, but would have been surprised to find that someone was already there. In fact, I was able to split the duties across two people, so it was better populated than when I am in town.

If you have the luxury of a roommate, house sitter, guard dog, militia, etc., then you may be in good shape already. But consider whether that person at your house is someone you want to put at risk (granted a rather remote risk), or if that person is comfortable with being on watch.

Related articles:

Continue to read up, you may come up with some ideas that work better for you than my suggestions.

• The dark side of geo: PleaseRobMe.com at CNET.
• Are We All Asking to Be Robbed? at Mashable.
• Google Buzz: Privacy nightmare at CNET.
• Facebook Privacy Complaint Ignites War of Words at PCWorld.
• Twitter Your Way to Getting Robbed at Mashable.
• HOW TO: Make Your Small Business Geolocation-Ready at Mashable.
• How Robbers Did Their Dirty Deeds Before Foursquare at Mashable.
• Friday Poll: Do Location Check-In Services Freak You Out? at Mashable.

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