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It's also a bit off the beaten track, unless you happen to be driving from Calgary to Edmonton and need to go to the bathroom. Still, we're closing in on the 100,000 mark and although it seems to me to have a small town feel, in Central Alberta it's a good sized city.
As an aside, I met RW on-line and in our first phone conversation he talked about his home town, Swift Current, a town of 25,000 in Saskatchewan, in such a way as to make me feel geographically challenged because I had never heard of it. I later learned that all Canadians seem to know a fair amount about any town, in any province, with a population of more than about 3,000.
People know about them, but that doesn't mean they actually go there voluntarily. And they certainly don't bring any kind of technology to any of the places they do go, well, not if the destination is in my neck of the woods.
I found that last bit out when I installed FourSquare on my phone-toy. If you are even less hip than I, you may not know that FourSquare is an app (yes, people actually use that poor excuse for a word) that lets you check in at various locations and tell the world, or your friends, that you are there. I hear that in bigger cities, popular people announce their presence and their minions flock to join them upon receiving the notification. If you hang out in one place more than anyone else, you get a badge identifying you as its mayor.
It appears that I could be the mayor of just about anyplace here. None of the places I go have been established as FourSquare venues, well, not unless you count City Hall, and I only go there to pay parking tickets. I thought to remedy this by making the coffee shop/cafe near my office into a venue, but really, what's the point? I have no minions, after all.
Because I have a bit of pioneer spirit, I carried on. I established said coffee shop as an official FourSquare venue. I then let FourSquare search my GMail contacts for possible minions. Alas, the only possibilities seem to be my friend Howard in Como, Italy or a person I Emailed accidentally about a year ago who lives somewhere North of Toronto.
Oh well, I forgot to stop by the cafe on my way home anyway. Maybe I can become the mayor there later today.
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Yep, that's me, Mr. Early Adopter with the scars to prove it.
ReplyDeleteSince Foursquare will let you check in without doing a geolocation check, you can become the mayor of your cafe from the comfort of your living room if you choose. :-)
Then there's Gowalla. They do check your geolocation and will not let you falsify your whereabouts.
I've used these applications for over a year, but just do so to see what all the fuss is about. I have yet to reap any joy from them, but then again I also live in an area that lack the critical mass to make it interesting. I am skeptical that this version of Foursquare can get non-techie-in-crowd traction. A lot of things about the UX and game mechanics would have to change, I just don't know what!
And i am definitely looking for joy, Howard :).
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