Checking In – Check It Out
Written by Ben Dyer
Friday, 05 November 2010 00:00
Watching the mid-term US elections from the comfort of my UK office has been absolutely fascinating. I am not American, and, I must admit, am rather naive when it comes to American politics, unless you count an education inspired by The West Wing repeats. The fascination for me hasn’t been the rise of the Tea Party or the drubbing most first term Presidents inevitably get, it’s the social element.
This morning when I powered up the internet’s seismograph, otherwise known as Tweetdeck, I was inundated with tweets from US friends. Most of the posts it has to be said, were automated via Foursquare. Foursquare, if you don’t know it, is a location-based game; users “check in” to venues and can earn points or badges along the way. For the US mid-terms the team behind Foursquare launched a dedicated election page; when users checked into polling booths they would receive an official badge. A “check in” is normally broadcast via the users’ social networks, hence the reason my twitter stream was full.
Because Foursquare is fundamentally a game, and as humans we like playing, the viral effect of earning Foursquare badges for performing a civic duty has spread like wildfire. One person I follow tweeted: “I really couldn’t be bothered to vote, but not earning a Foursquare badge means I can’t hide”
However the concept of ‘social voting’, as some are calling it, is not just the preserve of Foursquare and the US. I can recall in the UK that Facebook ran a reminder when you logged in on polling day, berating friends who didn’t have the “I have voted” status update was most enjoyable.
Social networking, regardless of its stratospheric growth is still fairly divisive. Even though the positive message about the benefits of engagement has been sold a thousand times there are those that just don’t see it. The Foursquare election campaign is a great antidote for the non-believers, using technology like this is hugely empowering and changes peoples’ behaviours.
By Ben Dyer, Product Development Director, Actinic. Originally published on BusinessZone.
