Foursquare, like all geo-location Apps, has come in for its share of criticism.
It's as much about privacy (people knowing where you are) and frankly, intrusive sharing. Foursquare is basically a way of tracking your location on a map.
There are absolutely some great geo-location Apps and in particular those that deliver coupons/deals based on your location but generally, people location proves somewhat unacceptable.
What it means is, that any of your friends or family, no matter where they are, "check in" to Foursquare, you receive a notification.
Even if they're not near you or indeed, if you have your notifications switched off! So a friend in Perth, goes into a bar, I get to hear about it. No problem about that, except if every time a friend goes into a bar, I'll get a lot of notifications but....it also means, they'll get notifications about me.
So when I walk into a bar, they hear about it and probably like you, I'm not too sure I'm happy about that at all. Indeed, for women, it raises huge safety concerns.
Already people are becoming more and more concerned about privacy, notably with Facebook but geo-locators take it to another stage. A stage perhaps, too far. The other problem is that few of us every understand the t&c's when we sign in nor do we ever really read them.
So if you're considering using these types of Apps, be careful.
They won't stop at this and for some of us, it's quite scary.
Especially now, if it's "always on". Online privacy issues is going to become a big discussion point when people begin to realise just what they're signing up to. And anything that's deliberately hidden in the small print, is not a good thing.
Companies argue that if you're concerned about disclosing your location, you shouldn't be using the App in the first place. True. If the company clearly told you in the first place what they were doing, indeed you might not have.
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