I lead a very boring life. I found this out through Foursquare.
In case you’ve been living in a cave for the last week and missed the latest next big thing, Foursquare is a “geolocation” app for your smartphone that lets every living person on earth know exactly where you are at every breathing moment…even if you’ve been living in a cave. Now the obvious question is “why would you want every living person on earth to know exactly where you are at every breathing moment”? Well, the idea behind Foursquare is that all your incredibly cool friends will know precisely which trendy place you’re visiting and drop in to buy you hip cocktails served by waitresses with dazzlingly white teeth.
The trouble is–I believe I mentioned–I lead a boring life. I checked my stats the other day and discovered I’ve never even been to a trendy place. In fact, the only place I ever check in is work, my dentist’s office and Costco. Excuse me for a moment, I think I need to doze off.
The "Local" Badge
Foursquare, besides being an incredibly valuable tool that lets burglars know exactly when you’re not home, also serves as a bit of a game. Participants can collect “badges” with exciting names like “adventurer” and “superstar” for visiting interesting and exotic places. So far my only badge is the “local” badge–apparently because I never go anywhere. You can also become “mayor” of a location for checking in there the most. I was briefly the mayor of WXYZ TV but was ousted in a coup orchestrated, I believe, by the Hungry Howie’s delivery boy.
This could get a guy down…but they don’t give “badges” for that. So I decided to turn lemons into a drink made out of lemons. I’ve developed a new “app” that I call Forgesquare. Instead of checking in at places you are…you check in at places you want to be. Exotic, hip places like Paris, Rome or Bad Axe. You’re standing in line at the Novi Costco with the industrial-sized pack of Depends and a case of dental floss, you whip out the Blackberry and check in on Forgesquare and voila!!! you’re in Istanbul drinking hip cocktails with Morgan Fairchild. At least that’s what all your friends will think when they see your check-in. And the chances of them running into you at the Novi Costco are extremely slim since they’ll all be checking in from some trendy place in Royal Oak.
I’m still working on the companion “app” that lets you post photoshopped pictures on Twitter of you standing in front of the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre.
I know this will probably create some chaos when everybody on earth is someplace else. And I’m sure businesses who want to use geolocation for marketing their products and services are going to have some issues. For instance the Bellagio Casino will keep sending me half price coupons for a prime rib dinner because they’ll be under the impression I’m at one of their blackjack tables raking in thousands of dollars when I’m really on my couch watching Man vs. Food.
Despite a few “bugs” I believe I have a pretty good idea here. If you have some thoughts on how to improve it just look me up.
You know where to find me.
Stephen
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The #Backchannel 2.0 