Foursquare-Style Checking In For Couch Potatoes 86
This CNN article discusses a new breed of mobile "check-in" apps for people who aren't particularly mobile. The news apps were borne from the popularity of Foursquare, Gowalla, and Facebook Places, but instead of focusing on locations you've been, they spotlight movies and TV shows you watch, as well as books you read and video games you play.
"These apps let users earn virtual rewards and meet fans with similar interests. Users also can push their check-ins to other sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, to keep the conversation going. They each have their own benefits on top of that, from giving users recommendations based on the things they already like to letting them unlock videos and other extras when they've become 'super fans' of a show. ... While people in the United States may all have different hobbies and engage in different activities away from home, 'we know most people do three things — they eat, they sleep and they watch TV,' [Miso's CEO, Somrat Niyogi said.] 'We think the market is massive. We think this is going to be a much bigger market' than location-based apps, he added."
GetGlue is great (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course on the downside that means that there are a number of people on GetGlue who will check into anything and everything as frequently as possible just in order to accumulate stickers/badges/achievements. Personally i only check into stuff that i'm actually doing and the people who've accumulated hundreds of stickers, thousands of "friends", and tens of thousands of "liked" things can irk me a bit, but i try and just remind myself that it's not actually a contest, despite what some of them seem to think. I'd rather have my stickers and "likes" reflect who i actually am, rather than how obsessively i can click on links.
Perhaps i should check out the other sites mentioned in the article, though i'm not sure if i'd want to maintain a presence on more than one such site. Checking-in when i start watching a show or playing a game or reading a book isn't too bad, but having to do so at two or three different sites might start to get a bit cumbersome.
I would like to know something (Score:3, Interesting)
In these days when the economy is in rough shape, unemployment is high, and jobs aren't easy to come by, where are people getting all this time to do this stuff?
Personally, between work, school, and girlfriend, I am often at a crossroads where I must only choose two of the three. Girlfriend has been in Norway for over two weeks, and school doesn't start until the 30th, so I've just had work and I still only manage to pull about 50 hours a week. It seems to me there are lot of people who are lucky and have enough free time, or there are a lot of people slacking off in other areas of their life. Hell, it took me 30 minutes just to find a parking spot when I got home at midnight last night.
Re:a cynical take (Score:1, Interesting)
http://www.ijustmadelove.com/ is exactly what it sounds like, and exactly what you described.
Re:I would like to know something (Score:3, Interesting)
unemployment is high, and jobs aren't easy to come by
doesn't that say it all?
plus you got time to post on /.
Re:Marketers are laughing... (Score:3, Interesting)
... and bankers are laughing while sitting on the couch in their office. Eating potato chips.
And that's where that expression comes from.