For the last two months, I've been openly discussing my experimentation with Foursquare, logging my location at all sorts of places throughout my travels, and - gasp - even discussing the fact I cheat, while noting others may not be cheating, but they sure are leaving a lot of stops out. While my conversation with product manager Siobhan Quinn helped to provide some relevance to this whole process, I am still playing along.While I am enjoying myself with my nonsense checkin stream, there are some surefire ways to tell people are taking location apps far too seriously. Here are 16 ways (Four squared, get it?) that I know you've got a problem. If I missed any, please do let me know.
- You know exactly how far away you have to be from a venue before you can check in, and also know how many different venues you can check into without leaving your house.
- If your phone is out of batteries, you return home to charge it instead of doing errands because you want to check in to those places once you go.
- You take the same routes to and from work so you can check in at various offices along the way, hoping to obtain mayorships without actually getting out of your car.
- You heavily consider or discuss with friends the benefits of going to a place where you are already mayor to boost your stats against going somewhere new to increase the number of venues.
- You set up or check in at venues for locations without buildings, such as "Highway 101" or actual people.
- You not only know what a "Super Swarm" is, but you can name every single one that has occurred.
- The Foursquare icon is in both your iPhone and iPad dock.
- If you not only achieved the Overshare badge with 10 checkins in 12 hours, but you wonder why the bar was set so low.
- You opened a gym membership and started working out just to get the Gym Rat badge. (Or complain when you don't get it)
- You recognize locals in your area who are Mayors of multiple places, and aggressively start searching Google to learn their weaknesses.
- If you actively have scouted all the nearby parks and are visiting them one by one, just to score the Babysitter badge.
- You wonder why you can't "Check in" that somebody called you on the phone, or that you accomplished basic tasks at the office.
- You refuse to meet with people unless they agree to check in at Foursquare with you.
- You get annoyed when you go to friends' homes that don't have Foursquare venues.
- You actively debate the merits of Foursquare over Gowalla and Brightkite to anyone who will listen.
- You set your alarm for after 3 a.m. on a weekday just to roll over and grab your phone to check in and grab the School Night badge.