Mary could only laugh when I told her I joined foursquare.com and was using this new social networking service. She didn’t care for facebook at first but she eventually joined… she didn’t understand Twitter but now she is all about it… But Foursquare? I am paraphrasing here but I believe her reply was something like ”Won’t be long and you’ll be the Mayor of a Gas Station!”
What is foursquare? (according to foursquare.com)foursquare is a cross between a friend-finder, a social city-guide and a game that rewards you for doing interesting things. We aim to build things to not only help you keep up with the places your friends go, but that encourage you to discover new places and challenge you to explore your neighborhood in new ways.
So here is a list of the reasons that I have joined Foursquare.com and maybe they might open your eyes as well and tempt you to give it a try:
- I am not normally one who ventures outside my box very often. I eat at the same places because I know and trust them. I would like that to be different but it is tough to bring the right sorts of things into my line of sight so that I choose the new thing over the known thing. Part of Foursquare.com is a social game that “rewards” me for trying new things and better yet, brings up ideas of new things around my current gps location. It does for me what Yelp and Urbanspoon failed to do which was get me thinking and moving towards the “new.”
- My company (Jackpie at Relapse Theatre) is looking for new ways to reward its frequent visitors. We will be adding in rewards for those who visit us a certain number of times and also something along the lines of a free pair of tickets per week for whoever holds the title of “mayor” for Jackpie Theatre.
- I am interested in where my friends are after they leave the theatre at night. If I decide I am up for hanging out a few minutes I don’t have to start making calls to see who is out… I can check foursquare.com and see that a couple are at Manuel’s Tavern, a few are at Octane and I can make my decisions accordingly. Ordinarily I would probably just decide it is easier to start my commute back home.
- Foursquare.com is fun. You get a badge for accomplishing certain tasks and points for each additional new thing you do each day. I use things that are fun. I don’t use things that are not fun. This one is fun. Fun.
So give it a try. Who knows… You might find yourself doing something new tonight! If you sign up… find me at http://foursquare.com/user/karwisch
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