I Know Where You Are
Ever since I purchased my 3G iPhone, I have been amazed at just how handy the location-based service applications are. Being lost in Bodega Bay a few weeks ago, I was happy to find a crab shack using Yelp and being swayed away from the many little 2-star rated restaurants on the main Highway 1 stretch.
Suddenly, I found myself being thrown into a whole new generation of “tracking.” In college, it was all about checking friends’ away messages on AIM. Then came Facebook with its News Feed. Now, services such as Loopt allow users to know exactly where friends in their network are. So you know, you can randomly show up at a bar where you know your friends are at. Creepy? Maybe slightly. Way too intrusive? Perhaps.
Recently, another company called Pelago, has created a new social network allowing users to “share real world adventures and discover places.” They’ve forged a partnership between this new service, Whrrl, and HBO to let devoted fans of the popular show “Entourage” track where their favorite stars hang out. Correction – not the stars – rather, the characters. The relationship will allow users to share opinions and recommendations. Interestingly, Vincent Chase, the lead character in “Entourage,” actually writes reviews. Seems like now, we’re not only interested in friends in our network and reality television star tracking – we’re now becoming active players in the fictional lives of our favorite TV personalities.
It’s clear that as mobile devices becoming more ubiquitous, software companies will continue to find new ways to make location-based offerings more intuitive and creative. Advertisers, it seems, are not too far behind.