First we got Gowalla and then we got Foursquare. At least that was the order in Sweden. Both took off quite rapidly and some of us both love it and use it for everything from party planning to personal branding (some with great success).
But both of these services always felt somewhat like a third leg. Their integrations with Facebook were somewhat crude and a lot of the social potential was wasted.
Enter Facebook Places. From what we can see so far Facebook Places is a real Foursquare/Gowalla killer. One reason is that you instantly get MANY of your friends on board. At least here in Sweden, Foursquare isn’t THAT big yet; and Facebook will swat it like a fly on the wall (pun intended). Another reason is that these users are actually your friends (or at least Facebook friends) and you thereby avoid having yet another social network to add and accept contacts to.
But the killer reason must be the social connection where you can tag the friends that are with you and that they can simply accept your locating them. That will probably increase the number of check ins dramatically, thereby creating way more activity than on Foursquare/Gowalla. Activity=pulse=life. In my mind, that means bye bye for Foursquare/Gowalla. Time will tell.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Walter,
I certainly wouldn’t rule out FourSquare just yet. It’s user base is still showing no signs of stopping, and the unlocking of badges is still a USP which Facebook places doesn’t have.
That said Facebook is looking into RFID technology where users could be rewarded for visiting a store without actively checking in (as you do with Foursquare).
I wrote a similar post here: http://invisibleinkdigital.com/digital-strategy-2/facebook-places-foursquare-gowalla-road/
But it’s always more interesting to take a stand, isn’t it.
Still, I’m not sure badges is a strong enough incentive when up against the social graph. At least not here in Sweden (Europe?) where Foursquare hasn’t tipped yet.
Will be an interesting game to follow.
I agree…living in London makes it easier to get the full Foursquare experience, but as soon as you move out of the city, that social interaction of knowing someone is nearby at location steeply tails off.
Would be interesting to have a comparison as to which European countries are active participants of Foursquare.