My Foursquare Experiment

Over the past few weeks I've been conducting a Foursquare experiment.  I have no friends on this social networking site.  Does that defeat the purpose?  Absolutely.  But I wanted to test the waters without making a fool of myself or over-sharing things that I don't want others to know - before I knew they shouldn't know them!

Here's what I've done so far:

1. Signed up for the site.
2. Made all of my information private.
3. Checked into various locations, including during my recent vacation.
4. Added a new place!
5. Became the mayor of said place.

So far, it seems to be going okay.  Nine times out of 10 I forget to check in, despite the fact that my phone has a good Foursquare app.  Without any friends, there doesn't seem to be much point to my checking in, although I do use it to track the distances of my bike rides.  (I'm sure there are dedicated exercise apps I could use instead.)

Will Foursquare be around for the long-term?  I'm not sure.  It seems like they need to add reviews in addition to the Tips section.  That would make me more likely to visit a particular place.  Also, lots of locations are missing or don't show up in search.  Perhaps this is because there aren't a lot of Foursquare users in my area just yet.

I've also read about check in fatigue.  There are apps to check you into your various location tools.  But what about the act of checking in itself?  I have a feeling it won't be long before people tire of this itself.  Obviously, phones will be able to check us in automatically someday - but this could be seen as an invasion of privacy that will freak out most, if not many, people.

I guess I'll keep playing with this tool and see where it goes from here!  But you won't be seeing my Foursquare updates on Twitter any time soon - unless they're to let you know that I passed a new biking milestone, like the 10 miles I hit on Saturday.  :)