As the social media bubble gets bigger and bigger and the pie looks tastier and juicier , there is a gamut of new applications and extrapolations that are flooding this space . One major subset of them are the location tagging services . These vary from a person tweeting or updating facebook about where he/she is manually to their phones automatically telling their entire social network where they are . I have even seen a service that tweets when a person makes love and tells us where the act happened ! That is an extreme aberration but all of us have these location tags filling our feeds and timelines now . I for one will NEVER use a location service on any social media platform . Why ? I will tell you in this post …
It was a while ago when I saw a lot of my friends setting up 4sq to tell me where they are and what they are doing , some even tell me what they are eating/drinking at the restaurant . My first question is , what is the use of that ? When I want to know where you are , I will call you , email you or DM you and ask you . If we need to meet up somewhere , we can set that up mutually . Assuming that we are not meeting , what other utility does the location service serve other than giving an update that can potentially open up your personal life to everyone . We need to remember that anonymity exists and sometimes misused on social media . There are a whole bunch of people who will stalk you and find your daily routes and habits and will not hesitate the misuse it . Why then should I open that door and be scared that a thief will walk in .
The next peeve I have with location services is that it is easy to be dishonest about my location , I can actually be at my backyard and checkin to a posh restaurant and list out the exorbitant menu that I am seeing . So what really is the utility of this information ? That is highly questionable . Moreover , there is a risk that a location spoofer might be targeted by a stalker or a burglar that thinks that he is an affluent guy who goes to posh places . That to me is an extremely scary prospect . Believe me , I know people who spoof their lifestyle as affluent on twitter and facebook and actually lead a pretty normal life in the real world . So in a way , the location services are encouraging dishonesty in social media .
The possibility of location tags being misused by anti-social elements to target large social gatherings is another big thing . I mean we may be inadvertently inviting a terror strike by pointing a target to guys that are looking for it . The new age terror monger is IT savvy and I am sure that the location services are one of the sources they use to determine crowded and regularly frequented location . You can call me paranoid , but so is not carrying toothpaste and shampoo on a plane .
We also need to understand that human society has not yet evolved to such a high state of co-existence that privacy can be sacrificed so readily .I have never understood the mad race for badges and the overwhelming need to become the Mayor of a place that I never own or even hold a stake in . Very frankly I will never find it in me to use a location tagger in my updates , the no list is way too big than the yes list for that !
I agree with your view and it has been a challenge to even try these location services. But somehow I feel its just a matter of time.
I was not ready to migrate to Facebook from Orkut, and hated Twitter at the fist sight. But slowly had to adjust. The World is moving towards these new trends, dont know how long I can resist!
@Bhupendra : You have a point there , change is inevitable . Resistance is futile , we will be assimilated !
Nice write up.
Me too feel what Bhupendra said is right. Even now, when I explain twitter to people, many ask ‘who on earth would use it?’.
In the first instance, it all sounds true. Why should we tell anyone ‘what we are doing’ or ‘where we are’?
Many things humans do, may not be based on logic. They just do it (like forwarding those stupid mails saying Microsoft is paying you to forward the mail) and when many people do it and there is someone to organize and promote it, it becomes an accepted practice and a hit.
You said it Shakthi, change is inevitable
@Shiju : You said it right !
The first thing to consider is bandwidth. Later on so many people would be generating so much data that there would literally be no one to one communication like we have now. In that sense, there would no longer be any need to spoof location either to mislead or to showoff.
The second point is that terrorism is always govt sponsored so it is always just strong enough to scare everyone but do not lasting damage. So location services will be used by terrorists but not so effectively that these need to be withdrawn en masse.
Location based services are here to stay. In fact, like you said “we’ll be assimilated”, I’d like to say that these services would be assimilated into a larger service. For instance, shopping discounts.
4sq type of services just serve to create some hype around location. Later on, we won’t have to check in, check out or fight for mayor.
For instance, we could have “chunky location” where we keep the location service on but it only communicates our position when we approach designated landmarks.
Another variant could be that continuous location data is translated into a qualification. So if we go for daily walks along a road, we get that qualification without revealing our actual location and time data. Now if something happens on that road and two people report it, the report of the person with that qualification would carry more weight.
Another variant would be discount based on probability. So if we frequent a location and end up buy A, B and C then those vendors can fine-tune their inventories based on our location data. Here again masking is possible, the location service only has to alert the vendors about possible swing in demand against which the vendors can pay the service a subscription fees and pay that location service’s customers with a discount.
@Amol I like your thoughts and hope that they come true !