Play Four Square in Wellington!
Foursquare has arrived in Wellington - and we're one of the first Australasian cities to be included!
But, you say, "I thought Four Square was a chain of over-sized dairies with a charmingly retro Dick Frizzell logo!" To which we'd say, "Ho ho, you cheeky post-ironic urbanites, we mean Foursquare, the location-based social networking game that's taking the world by storm!"
You may remember back in September we wrote about Twitterplaces, which rather sadly shut up shop almost immediately thereafter. Well, Foursquare was the inspiration for Twitterplaces: when you go to a new place; a bar, restaurant, park, anything, you "check-in"; and then you can see who of your friends are there.
And that's just the beginning. There's an overview of it all here, but here's the basics.
You can leave tips for things to do at each place, or add other people's tips to your list; you earn points for check-ins outside work hours, and you can earn badges for various "achievements", like the Bender badge (when you are out for four nights in a row), or the Gym Rat badge (when you are a regular at places tagged as a "Gym").
And: you can become Mayor of a spot by being the person checking-in most often in the last 60 days (though perhaps one should exercise discretion as to where one checks-in if one doesn't want to become Mayor of a supermarket or shopping centre, like <coff> some of our readers—whom we are too polite to name).
One of the nice things that's happened in other cities is that Mayors are often rewarded by the proprietors of their places - and that's what's happened here already at Mojo Old Bank, where Matt will stand a free coffee to the newly crowned Mayor. We can think of a few other places that we'd like to see extending this sort of courtesy! (Especially the ones we go to often.)
Foursquare depends on having some sort of internet capable mobile device: there's a mobile web version, as well as the inevitable iPhone and Android apps - and by design these are the only ways you can do check-ins.
So sign up, get out there, and see if you can unseat Pablo G. from the top of the Wellington Leaderboard!
He he, I'm #11 on the leaderboard yeah!
Very addicted too...
Geek trivia! Foursquare is named after the schoolyard ball game - you can see a stylisation of it in the logo. An earlier, similar project by the same team was called Dodgeball, so Foursquare logically follows from that.
Also, the new Four Square on Tory Street has been added as a location, so you can check in for bonus ironic meta hipster effect.
And watch out for weird spellings. Sweet Mother's Kitchen is listed as a location, but so is "Sweet Mothers Kitchen" of "Courtney Place". So just as a basic courtesy to other Foursquare users, make sure you can actually spell the name of the place you're going to.
Soon superusers will emerge (based on their activity adding new venues and tips and the like) who will be able to correct those sorts of errors.
There's a few errors, too; but the database looks like it originates with a company in San Francisco, so that's not too surprising.
I think we need a special Wellington badge for checking in at that Four Square. I'll suggest it. :-)
i think spelling may be the number 1 reason i may never play 4 square.
Whereas, I probably shouldn't play it as I am hardly ever anywhere interesting (apart from home) in the evenings.
Morning - I am keen to do a story for RNZ on this if anyone's willing to take me out for a session? Cheers Simon simon.morton@radionz.co.nz
What a load of old shyte... really. In terms of meritorious group activity it makes Twister look like the Bolshoi Ballet. Could we just fast-forward through this dumb romance of the masses with iPhone fueled geo-location vapidlications until they deliver something worthy of comment? It's as if the Times Literary Supplement suddenly took, as its canon of reference, the amassed junk mail of the globe. Truly an embarrassment of riches.
I should note that Mojo Old Bank now has a promo on their Foursquare venue page - at the moment it's a free coffee on every fifth check-in from there. Could be hit quite a bit...
something tells me pablo will be the king of wellington town for a while
I don't understand all the checkins for suburbs and workplaces etc.
I thought the main idea was about discovering entertainment venues and finding friends on a night (or day) out.
I think that's people getting a bit overenthusiastic. I've seen people checking in at Pak'n Save, which makes me wonder if they really are angling for an impromptu meet-up in the tuna aisle.
No, really, being Mayor of Pak'n'Save is something to aspire to!
Though I too need to cut down on gratuitous check-ins.
I suppose it depends what the objective of the site is: they say in the help it's supposed to be "50% friend-finder, 30% social cityguide, 20% nightlife game" which probably is a pretty good hint that we're supposed to check in at those cool places where we are likely to meet our friends.
For example, I never meet my friends in the Wellington City Library, so why the hell am I checking in from there? But I do come across them by accident or design at coffee shops, so that's probably OK.
I guess some restraint is called for. :-) And more people-about-town rather than bored suburbanites with iPhones.
and pack n save petone is teh bomb
You wanted pablo unseated. It is done.
Hey - you got it wrong about the Four Square logo - it wan''t designed by dick frizzell at all. The logo was developed in 1948 and in wide use by the early fifties - dick was still in short pants - born 1945.1
I made that mistake once too. Dick Frizzell used the Four Square logo in his artwrok, which is probably where the confusion arose.
I did know that when I wrote those words. My mistake was assuming everyone else also knew it, and thus would recognise the use of irony.
Clearly one has to be A Certain Age to know these things.
Does anyone know if there is a NZ version of Social Great - a 'wheres the crowd' application/site based on where people say they are on Four Square??
Thanks!
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