Two Slashes

Late last night, I heard about a new product from Google called Latitude, designed in the intent of keeping you updated with the locations of your friends and allowing you to let them know where you are.  Despite a rather busy day today, I ended up spending a few minutes playing with it.

This isn’t the first time somebody’s suggested that your friends are interested in more than just answering what you’re doing, but the fact that this service comes with your Google account means that there’s already a huge potential userbase compared with the limited registration at services like Brightkite.

The idea itself comes in two parts, one for your iGoogle homepage, and one for your mobile phone of choice (though better iPhone support is still in the works).  Sadly, this isn’t integrated directly into Google Maps (yet), so anybody who doesn’t use the customized homepage is going to be left out in the cold…or at least a portion of the service.

Essentially, the mobile phone software is an update to Google Maps which allows you to post your GPS information automatically to Latitude and display pushpins for your friends.  This is where I believe Latitude where be most useful, as you’re likely to be doing something other than stalking out a good time while you’re at home.

The pushpins representing your friends show you not only their location, but allow you to get in touch with them with a phone call, IM, or text message, or find cool venues you both could meet up at.

If you don’t want to automatically update your location, you can manually set a pushpin to represent it using your phone or the web interface.  Of course, this isn’t as fun unless you’re claiming to be swimming across the Atlantic or something.  (Oh wait, I’m getting ideas…this could be bad.)

Google seems to have looked to Brightkite for their privacy settings, allowing you to not only declare which friends you want to see, but how accurately you want your location displayed on a per-friend basis.  However, you don’t have to make a distinction about which contacts are “trusted”, which means that you won’t have to worry about any moral dilemmas over labeling some people as such but excluding others.  (Hey, it’s a legitimate benefit.)

Of course, it’s not difficult to imagine Latitude being used in a less-than-stellar manner.  ABC’s already touting the service as a way to micromanage your kids, and it’s only a matter of time before someone repurposes their old phone as a tracking device for their stalking toolkit.  And I’m wondering how this will do for trying to blame traffic on being late…or whether Google might be looking at a few more subpoenas.

The social concept behind Latitude is cool, and makes for a neat tie-in to other Google features that can’t be matched by some of the competing rivals, but at the same time it makes me wonder if Google really is planning on world domination.  Think about it:  Google probably already handles your e-mail, calendar, contact list, word-processing, number-crunching, trip planning, and Internet searching/browsing needs.  Add where you are in real time to that list, and Google perhaps knows more about you than you know yourself.

I don’t think I’ll be participating (for the moment), except in a humorous capacity, so if you’re thinking of following me around, I apologize.  (I require all stalkers to be physically present and wearing a trenchcoat and sunglasses at all times.)  If you don’t have the stringent requirements I do, you might find this worth poking around at, though.  It definitely shows that there’s still plenty of space left in redefining social networking.

Disclaimer:  I am not actually writing this post from Wrigley Field.  However, I wish it were a few months from now and that that pushpin was accurate.  Oh well.