Geo social networking is the latest and greatest form of social networking.   Some people find geo social networking addicting and wonderful while others consider it dangerous and a tool for stalkers.  What do you think about geo social networking?

What is Geo Social Networking?

Geo social networking allows users to use their smart phones to mark down and share with friends where they are at any given time.  Users can share on social networks their location at restaurants, movie theaters and other places.  Friends of users will see the name of the venue as well as the coordinates on the map.

FourSquare

FourSquare is a leader in social networking that allows users to “check in” to places.  Users can even check in with friends.  As users check into different places they can earn badges.  Badges that can be earned included things such as the gym rat badge when someone checks into a gym multiple times during the week.  Another badge is the swarm badge which is awarded when a lot of foursquare users are all checked in to the same place.  This often happens at concerts and sports games. Another fun feature is that users can become a mayor of a certain places if they hold the most check ins to the venue.  Some restaurants will even go as far as giving a free cup of coffee or discount coupons to the mayor of their establishment since they are helping them to gain free promotion.

Facebook Check In

Facebook invented it’s own check in tool where users can check into place directly from their Facebook moblile accounts.  Users can also tag friends that they are with or add a message.  One main difference is that Foursquare allows people to share their location on many social sites including Facebook all at once, where as the Facebook check in is for Facebook users only.