You’ve heard it before, but it usually refers to where your business or home is located. These days in the tech world it’s about geolocation. And the SXSW conference was the OK Corral of this modern-day shootout. The “location wars” were between two main contenders – Foursquare, who made a splash when it debuted at last year’s festival, with some calling them “the next Twitter”, and Gowalla, an upstart Austin-based company.
CNN explains both services are just a year old, and make their SXSW appearances in the hopes that online trend-setters here will embrace their apps and spread the word after they fan back out across the United States and abroad.
The two rivals let smartphone users “check in” at bars, restaurants and other hangouts and share their locations with friends while earning virtual rewards, and were arguably the biggest topic at this year’s South by Southwest (SXSW). Posters around Austin pitted the two parties against each other in a faux boxing match labeled “The Geosocial Showdown.” Their rival parties — both of them well-attended – were across the street from each other creating what Foursquare CEO equated to “spring break for nerds.”
Foursquare has announced partnerships with Starbucks, Bravo and others, while Gowalla has inked a deal with the Travel Channel, some smaller companies and had SXSW-specific partnerships with Chevy and Palm.
There’s talk of internet speed-sters Facebook, Google and even Apple throwing their virtual hats in the ring.
Jay Adelson, CEO of news-sharing site Digg, said partnerships could be key to making geolocation popular. “The idea that maybe if I check in some place I get a free drink or something? OK … now it’s starting to really get interesting. That’s the kind of stuff I think in the next 12 months you’re going to start seeing.”
Tags: Internet Speed