http://mashable.com/2010/01/23/local-trends-analysis/

Many online services are now pushing to know a user's location. Twitter, being among them, has many advantages in doing this.

Just like FourSquare, which we talked about in class, allowing people to know where you are by updating your status helps businesses. Personally, if I want to know where someone is, I'd just ask them. But businesses can't do that. If they know someone is heading to their bar, shop, or restaurant, they can help make it more personal. They can welcome them inside, help them out with what they need, and help them have a positive experience. It's kind of like knowing how to help a person before you meet them.

But the advantages of known-location don't stop there. Twitter is believed to be getting advertising soon. If someone has their location posted, advertisements can be tailored to places nearby, possibly growing their business. This reminds me of the ads on Facebook that are tailored to fit my "interests" and "activities" that I post on my profile.

Trending topics are also a big part of Twitter. Now users can see what their local area is talking about. Maybe there's a big sports game downtown everyone is going to. Or maybe a celebrity was spotted in a local restaurant. The large-scale trending topics obviously won't have those things listed. But if it's a big deal in your local town, you could find out instantly from your local trending-topics. All this because of location-based apps.

More of my thoughts on all this:

1. I think it's amazing how much Twitter has grown. What was originally a basic status updating website is now one of the most popular means of communication, advertising, business growing, blog growing,(and more) phenomenon. Now with this added feature, who knows what Twitter will be like in 5 years.

2. Although I see the advantages of knowing someones locations for friends and businesses, I'm not sure if I'd want everyone knowing where I was every second. It'd be cool at times, but I see this as a perfect way for stalking. How much easier could it get? Online predators anyone? What's happened to that big fear we hear about all the time?

3. Sometimes I think technology and new trends are growing so fast we don't even know what's going on. Sure this might be cool, but is it necessary? If you are just using Location-apps to let people know where you are, why not just call someone? A lot of this social media stuff has turned into "look at me everyone, look what I'm doing." Everyday I see people posting model-like pics on Facebook to get attention, just waiting for that "OMG you look gorgeous" comment. Or the people who post statuses such as: "getting black-out drunk tonight!!!" or "Hate my life" Why do we need to know this? Why do we feel the urge the share it? Besides the obvious advantages this new location-feature has for advertisers and businesses, I just don't know if users actually NEED it. Just my two-cents.