Location: Are nosotros in that location yet?

Mobile, location-based services will alter everything, but only after everything changes

Contributing Columnist, Computerworld |

Friends, family unit and loved ones will soon assemble to share that about cherished of annual American traditions: Getting drunk, pigging out and watching behemothic men try to kill each other on Idiot box.

Super Basin Sunday is also that special day when we see brand-new, large-budget commercials. But if yous're a existent sports fan, you'll notice that lineup of products advertised will exist generally dissimilar from those hawked during regular-season games. Super Basin ads involve mainstream products, including movies, fiscal services and Web hosting services. But during the regular season, the ads are all selling beer, motor oil and tires. Why is that?

Advertisers know that the demographic of the Super Basin is much broader than that of the fans who watch football all season long. They presume, correctly, that real football fans are very likely to be American men who drinkable a lot of beer and who care very much near branding when it comes to motor oil and tires. Of all that "demographic information," location is absolutely vital. For example, the motor oil and tire commercials would make sense to an audience of football watchers in Saudi arabia -- if Saudis watched football in significant numbers, which they don't -- but the beer companies would exist wasting their money.

Ad professionals take ever obsessed over "location data." That's why everybody wants your Cypher code. Every fourth dimension yous sign up for anything anywhere, they want that Null lawmaking because, combined with gender and age, the ZIP code tells advertisers quite a lot nearly you lot. For starters, people within specific ZIP codes tend to have roughly similar income levels. Once they know that, they can guess what kinds of things you exercise, and what sorts of things you purchase. They know the local weather, for example (no demand to advertise ski equipment to people in Texas). They know what stores are available to you. They can even guess your political and religious affiliations with surprising accuracy. The corporeality of valuable information well-nigh people that can be gleaned from a simple ZIP lawmaking is enormous.

The future of advertisement is the application of ever more authentic, more specific targeting of prospective customers. Advertisers want to know everything virtually you, including what your make preferences are, your habits, your income and more. But most of all, they want your location. Non but your ZIP lawmaking. Not only the neighborhood you're living in. They want to know exactly, precisely where you are at all times. That way, they can make yous offers that are perfectly relevant to you, right here, right now.

Advertisers are collecting information about y'all already, especially your ownership patterns, from Amazon.com, Facebook, Gmail and other online services. Amazon.com was a pioneer in this expanse. Even 10 years ago, it was sending me e-mails suggesting books that were exactly the kinds of books I was interested in.

And advertisers will somewhen get your location from your cell phone'southward built-in GPS. But when?

Why nosotros aren't there withal

If you look closely plenty, you tin can run into companies and users alike dancing effectually the periphery of total location sharing. Everyone is dipping their toes in the water, but nobody's jumping in yet.

Apple tree notified iPhone app developers this week, for example, that the utilize of the iPhone Os's "Core Location" framework was allowed simply to provide data "benign" to the utilise. Specifically, the company said, "if your app uses location-based information primarily to enable mobile advertisers to deliver targeted ads based on a user's location, your app volition exist returned to y'all by the App Store Review Team for modification before it can be posted to the App Shop."

Apple was also granted a patent this calendar week for location sharing technology. The system would enable one caller to request another's location, and for permission to be granted, with one button push each. Only so far that engineering has non even been announced for any real product.

Google rolled out "click to phone call" functionality for ads in its mobile version of Google Maps. The service seamlessly uses location data from your phone's GPS to punch a local, rather than centralized, phone number of a company whose advertisement you see on your phone. It lets you phone call the local store, but it doesn't yet permit the store telephone call you lot.

The "click to call" service comes fast on the heels of Google'due south "Near me now" and "Explore right here" services, which use location information to tell yous what'southward going on in your surface area. Merely, again, it's a timid testing of the location waters.

Location-based social services, such as Foursquare, Gowalla, BrightKite, TriOut, Yelp, Loopt, Plazes, Flook and others, utilize location information to facilitate social interaction, and social interaction to facilitate the discovery of new things.

Near of these services are hobbled by what I perceive as business concern near location privacy. Some of them are based on location-based status updates, where users can broadcast their locations if they choose to do so. Others involve discovery, where people post something they've seen for others to find in the same location later.

All these are dancing around the edges of what we really want, which is to be able to know where all our friends and family unit are at whatsoever time. We want to exist able to "look up" people'south locations as easily as we look up their phone number in our address volume. And we want to be able to set up notifications, so we're alerted when people nosotros intendance about are nearby.

We want that real-time data virtually others. The problem is, do we want others to know where we are?

Resistance is futile

The squeamishness people feel about the privacy incursions by location-based applications is zero more than than future daze. In fact, it has ever been pretty easy for strangers to effigy out your location. Telephone books, for example, enable anyone who knows your proper noun to detect out where you slumber at nighttime. Anyone who encounters you at work knows where you'll be most days. But we don't give these "privacy violations" much idea because they're old. We worry only about the new ones.

Near of united states of america volition be willing to manus over our privacy to advertisers on a silver platter for the right incentives. Money, for example. Cheapskate bargain hunters, coupon clippers and deal-seekers would happily opt into a system that alerted them to exclusive discounts from stores they happened to be walking by.

And complimentary is a powerful incentive. One could imagine a service totally devoted to free stuff. Whenever someone is offer something free (costless car wash, gratis cup of coffee, complimentary movie tickets) at your location, the phone rings. For example, just equally you're within 200 yards of a Starbucks offer a gratuitous latte, the telephone rings to tell you about it. Would you sign up for that?

Such location-based services could spread airline-similar flex pricing across a huge number of industries. For example, every bit movie theaters run into that seats aren't being filled, they could keep dropping ticket prices every bit the testify offset gets closer, and alarm people who have opted in and are besides shut enough to the theater to make the curtain.

Please don't think all this is pure speculation. It'southward going to happen. And shortly.

Google, Apple and Twitter are making moves that volition probable dorsum their push button for location-based advertizing. Google acquired a mobile advertizing company called AdMob. Apple purchased Quattro Wireless. Twitter acquired Mixer Labs.

And it's when these major companies jump in that the balance of u.s. will follow. If it plays its cards right, I think Facebook could ain this space, mainly because people have already established closed social networks involving people they've decided to open upward to. We already tell our Facebook friends everything we're doing, oft supplemented with personal pictures and juicy details. Location services just automate information technology.

But let'south hear your opinion. Where are y'all on the coming earth location services and location-based advertizement?

Mike Elgan writes about engineering and global tech culture. Contact Mike at mike.elgan@elgan.com, follow him on Twitter or his blog, The Raw Feed.

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