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Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by alexandros on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @05:38AM (#465560)
While this may sound scary at first, I suspect it could mature, with people finding the appropriate social norms around this new technology, and slowly integrating into their daily lives. In this sense it could resemble the social network or the mobile phone, where even luddites eventually cave in, as it eventually becomes a no-brainer, benefits greatly outweighing drawbacks.

That said, there is still a long way to go and this technology still has not found a compelling application. The only reason I would consider using it is to be one of the first people to actually figure it out on the ground and potentially find those compelling uses, if they exist.

Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by axod on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @06:56AM (#465625)
I think there's a pretty solid trail of startups who have tried and failed to make a compelling use case for it so far.
Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by ajju on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @10:37AM (#465854)
Sharing your location is, at least right now, more of a feature than a product in users minds. If you have a google maps client on your phone already, you'll probably try it. Users probably won't download an app that does just that as readily.

Google has the classic big company/large install base edge in this area.

Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by wallflower on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @10:54AM (#465874)
If sharing the location is not the neat feature - perhaps it's visualizing/mining that information accrued over your daily life/time. Here's some concepts from MIT

http://web.media.mit.edu/~orkan/projects/portraits/main.html

Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by axod on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @10:44AM (#465861)
Completely agree. It's a feature, and if it was a free add-on, it'd be useful.

eg if someone is going on a long journey, be able to track them to see they get there safely etc

But I don't think it's anything more than a feature.

Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by riklomas on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @07:01AM (#465632)
Yahoo has also tried too, not to much success though: http://fireeagle.yahoo.net/
Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by ajju on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @10:34AM (#465850)
Except fireeagle doesn't have a client with an install base as large as Google Maps' and is really more of a pipe/aggregator than a client in the first place.
Re:See where your friends are with Google Latitude by brlewis on Wednesday February 04, 2009 @09:26AM (#465758)