By Ah, check-ins. You’ve taken the world as we know it by storm. Who doesn’t want to know where their friends and families are at any given point in the day? And after Facebook, Foursquare, Gowalla, and more have all offered up their own check-in platform, Google felt it was necessary to follow suit.
Today, they introduced version 5.1 of Google Maps that adds check-in features to the Latitude portion of the application. It’s no ordinary service either: check-outs also come into play, doubling the social location-aware experience. Automatic check-ins are a pretty nice deal, too.
Will you use it though? There are no deals, no badges, and no tie-ins to social networks. Unless a majority of your friends are on Google Latitude, this service seems kind of dull on paper. That’s no reason to not get excited, though: things could easily change as time moves on. (We know Google’s looking to be a major player in that “deals” category, anyway, as evidenced by their failed acquisition of Groupon.)
Big Latitude fans will love this, but for the rest of you it’s going to be a novelty feature. Check it out anyway by searching for the update in the Android market. [via Google]
Still no app2sd, and it hangs around in memory when it doesn’t need to.
No Thanks! It’s bad enough now that everyone has cell phones and we’re always available, the last thing I want is everyone knowing exactly where I am at any given time of the day or night. It’s an irritating feature on facebook when people use it and I would imagine it being just as irritating in this format.
In fact it starts itself when the phone is booted (why?)
I appreciate the free services Google provides but ideally they should be fixing old things before adding new ones.
i dont know, i think that all this new technology it giving out too much info about ourself to other, o well i guess if you feel comfortable with it is no biggy..
I find it interesting how much people hate Bing and worship Google. Little do they realize how evil Google really is and how much information they have about everyone that uses their services. Like Jose said, I suppose if you’re comfortable with it, it’s no big deal.
I see Gingerbread. Come on Google my N1 is starving!
As long as my friends can’t check me into anywhere w/o permission, I don’t care.
@ ToastnJam
If Google’s so “evil”, why are they providing Tweets via voicemail for a country (Egypt) devoid of ISP connections because of their authoritarian government?
http://www.neowin.net/news/egypt-shuts-off-last-isp
Why do they offer their web services for free? It’s inappropriate to call a company evil because of their wireless data collection when they do so much good. All these privacy lawsuits are for nothing. Google has no “evil plan” to exploit the world’s secrets, and they’re closely monitored by the U.S. government. Should they act more resposibly? Yes–especially within the international community.
A belief in conspiraices only makes people look uneducated.
@ToastnJam: It’s opt-in and they typically use it so that the ads you get in free ad-supported services are actually relevant. Saves you from being blanketed with irrelevant spam and saves companies money because they are wasting less on advertising to people who don’t apply. Advertising isn’t always an evil when it pays for great free services.
As far as Latitude, this is kinda funny. I remember using it on my old WM phone back in the day but nobody else would join because GPS hadn’t made it to Blackberry or iPhone yet.
I don’t actually get this, could someone clarify for me.
All of my latitude friends can already see where I am pretty much all of the time.
How does this differ/ add anything?
I use Latitude with a very tight group of friends and family and it’s a great tool. I’ll be using the automatic check-in to places I visit frequently.
@ToastnJam You almost have to assume you have no privacy nowadays pretty with much any service you use. People just tend to favor Google over Bing because Bing sucks.
Love it, but uninstalled due to memory used. Apps2sd is a priority as this is a huge app. Google – Please don’t ignore us and enable apps2sd.
This information is already collected from your cell phone provider anyway as to where your location is at a particular point in time. Yes, it does take a court order to get to it though.
People just need to be wiser about what they are sharing and with whom. I like that latitude does give you options to obscure your more granular location for specific contacts.
Holy shit, it seems every single person on this site does nothing but bitch and moan about no apps to sd and bullshit like that. It’s 2011 people, you motherfuckers need to get newer phones and stop complaining. How broke are you assholes? Buy a new phone and stop bitching.
would be more useful if latitude was more accurate. Its never right, almost like it puts you where the tower is because of data and not your real location. I realize that GPS enabled will help that but still.
And you assholes really pay attention to all this privacy shit. Its a phone for Christ sakes, besides not one of you assholes really cares about it. Its not like your spies or work for the Government, LOL!!!!!! Fucking LOSERS!!!!!
Jon I agree somewhat with you..but really why the vulgar language sailor? But I am amazed at the people who nitpick an app or proggie for ‘no move to SD feature’ or an app needing ‘my phone state or location for no reason’. Afa my friend jon, get me some soap!
@Bluedan… jon po and Goldni are correct. It is ridiculous when ‘power’ users know just enough to complain about something like apps2SD not being available on apps.
Apps that have home screen widgets can’t be moved to SD, and neither can most apps that have running background services!!!
If you claim to know about apps2sd yet you are not able to hide your location… that is pretty pathetic.
Also look like most people here are suffering from delusions of self grandeur… the only person who cares where you are is your mum… at that is if you are lucky! The only thing maybe your phoen will give you away next time you take yourt fat-ass to MacDonalds when you told your partner you were on a diet!
Apps2SD is a shim to solve the problem for minority of Android users. It will fade away as people phase out the older phones with limited application storage space.
I was all for Apps2SD in Cyanogen, and then when Google added it to the OS. Since switching to a newer phone, I actually hate when apps install to the SD, so I turn off that feature.
It may be a critical issue to those who are early adopters, but as the shift moves to phones with large built in memory the issue will diminish.
I honestly think I’m the only person I know that loves and uses anything Google … otherwise I’d use this feature like wildfire!
There are already several apps for other location-based services which allow automated check-ins, so this is not really a novelty feature.
For Facebook Places, the Smart Places app is an example (currently available on Android — I’m its developer).