With an estimated revenue generation of over 3.3 billion dollars by 2013, location based social networking has become the juggernaut in the vast landscape of friend finding. Despite being listed as one of the “15 Hot New Technologies that will Change Everything”, by PC World, LBS is still met with hesitation. Even the savviest of social networkers are unsure of their feelings about sharing location. The biggest concern seems to be regarding privacy issues. While privacy is a huge concern to the individual user, it’s an even bigger concern to the developers of location based social networking. The goal of LBS services is to provide a way to keep your friends and family up to date in a safe, secure manner.

I’m sure you can remember a time when giving out your email address, using a credit card online, and distributing photos of your children on photo sharing sites was done with great hesitation. However, through mass adoption and availability these services became more main stream and less scary. I expect that we will see this trend in location based social networking. The PC World article agrees stating,

“LBS is growing fast. The only thing holding it back is the slow uptake of GPS-enabled phones (and carriers’ steep fees to activate the function). But with iPhones selling like Ben & Jerry’s in July, that’s not much of a hurdle to overcome. Expect to see massive adoption of these technologies in 2009 and 2010.”

In this next section we’ll explore some of the most popular misconceptions about location based services and a few of the concerns we have heard here at WHERE.

1. Location updates are automatic: WHERE’s Buddy Beacon does not automatically update your location as you move. Your friends, family or questionable accquaintance will NOT be able to track every step you take. The only locations shared with friends are the ones you choose to share. For example: You are at a Madonna concert in Boston and feel the need to brag to all your friends about the amazing set Her Madgesty is delivering. You would open up the application, set your status to “Rocking out to Madonna”, the phone would locate you and voila. Your status and location is now available to your network. That status and location will stay there until the next time you choose to update it.

2. Anyone can see where you are: Not true. Location based social networking tends to be a little more intimate, so you can choose to invite and accept buddy requests from those whom you trust. Also users must have your phone number to invite you into their network. (Yet another reason NOT to give your number to that dude in the bar!)

3. Big Brother is Watching: WHERE does not track your every movement with the intention of selling that information or using it to score advertising. This has never been our policy and we stand firmly behind that position.

WHERE is simply a means of putting your people, your places and your thoughts in one place that is accessible to you and your close network of friends. If you have any questions regarding WHERE and it’s privacy issues, send them to support@ulocate.com

Photo Credit: Joe the WOP via Flickr

One of WHERE’s most popular GPS based widgets is the handy, Gas Buddy. Gas Buddy allows users to find the closest and cheapest gas options in their local area. When you have the WHERE application installed on your cell phone you are able to locate all gas stations in your area and compare prices, allowing you to find the best price for filling up! In the past several weeks, we’ve had a couple questions about how Gas Buddy information is derived and how often it is updated. Here’s a little intro into how Gas Buddy works and what you can do to keep the information as accurate as possible.

Here is how Gas Buddy works: GasBuddy web sites allow motorists to share information about low priced fuel with others as well as target the lowest priced stations to save money when filling up at the pumps!

What does this mean? Well it means, sometimes it may not always be up-to-the-minute accurate or maybe a gas station near you is not listed. What can you do about it? Get involved, register with the Gas Buddy website and document gas prices in your local area.

If you are an iPhone user you may have noticed some ads in the bottom of the WHERE application last week. We are testing out different ad formats and wanted to sincerely apologize to our users for the untargeted and clearly irrelevant ads. We received a few complaints and just wanted to take this opportunity to let you know we are listening. We’ve stopped the ads and are working with our advertising partners to deliver more relevant ads.

To keep up with the latest WHERE news, please subscribe to our RSS Feed or follow us on Twitter.

Today AT&T revealed a release date for the the much hyped Blackberry BOLD . After many delays and setbacks the new Blackberry 9000 Bold smartphone is ready to hit shelves on a November 4th.

Some of the new features of the Bold include GPS & Wi-Fi together, resulting in faster internet speeds. The phone also has a extra-crisp wider 480×360 display and a built in 2-megapixel camera.

WHERE will be available on the BOLD, through application stores, BerryStore and Built for Blackberry.

While there are many practical uses for the WHERE mobile application, like finding the cheapest gas or locating the closest Starbucks, there are plenty of fun ways to use WHERE. Today we tackle, “Planning a Romantic Date using WHERE.“

First you need to get some wheels. Girls dig wheels! Using the Zipcar widget, you can locate the nearest Zipcar location and set up a rental. Pick up the car, and you are on your way.

What’s next? You need to pick her up! Use the directions widget to get driving directions to her house. But before you get there, use the Local Search to find a florist on the way. Pick up some flowers to let the girl know how special she is.

You got the car, flowers and you picked up your date, now what? Bust out the Eventful widget and find out what’s happening in your city. Book tickets to the event through StubHub and your evening is planned.

It’s probably a good idea to get a bit to eat before the event (wouldn’t want your stomach to be growling during the show). Check out the YELP widget to find restaurants and reviews around the event venue.

If the night has gone right, and we know it did, you may want to take the date to your favorite star gazing point…who knows, something magical may happen. The Skymap widget gives you access to all the constellations, just imagine how impressed she will be when you point out Gemini & Bellatrix. Score.

If you have used WHERE to plan a date or any other fun event, tell us your story. Visit us on Facebook, Twitter or GET Satisfaction!

As part of our ongoing customer support, we’ve decided to set up camp at Get Satisfaction! Get Satisfaction is a site which allow WHERE™ users to ask questions, report a problem, share an idea, or join in conversations about our products and company. The best part of Get Statisfaction is that WHERE™ employees will actually get to respond to, answer and join the discussions.

What are you waiting for, Get Satisfaction!

The WHERE 1.1 iPhone went live in the iTunes App store last week and was met with great reviews from users. The more vibrant map tiles and new widgets have greatly enhanced the user experience. We thought it might be a good time to take a closer look at the two new widgets available on the iPhone.

Local Notes

Local Notes is a new widget which allows you to leave notes about a location for everyone to view.
How to write a local note:
1. Touch down on your location and go to the list view.
2. Tap on “Add New Note”
3. Type in your note and hit “Save”
4. Go back to the map view and your note will be in red.

FlickPics

Flickpics gives you a photographic window to the world around you, with photos geotagged by other Flickr members.
To see images geotagged in your local area.
1. Go to the Flickr widget
2. Click on the list view at the top right corner.
3. Voila, you will see a grid view of all the pics tagged in that geographic location.

Part of our commitment to users is an enhanced GPS user experience. If you have any feedback or have an idea for a widget, find us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter and let us know your thoughts.

• WHERE™, the location based iPhone Application that you have grown to love and was coined as ‘irresistible’ by Boston.com, got an upgrade! And by upgrade I mean overhaul! The 1.1 release of WHERE for iPhone is now available and includes some fantastic new features.

Two new widgets:

• Local notes - Now you can leave notes on your locations. Loved the cheesecake at Rusticos? Leave a note for all to to find.
• Flickr widget - Allows you to search for geo-tagged Flickr pictures or take photos with your camera and upload them to your flickr account

Other New Features:

• Camera integration - You will now be able to use their camera phone to take photos of your location and upload it to your Flickr account to be shared with all of your friends.
• Self Reporting - Allows you to manually update your location. This is helpful if location services are not available at your location as well as if you want to search another area.
• Improved Buddy Beacon - You can update your buddy beacon status within any widget.

This release is available from your phone if you already have the WHERE application or from the iTunes app store for our new users.

The WHERE iPhone application was included in a Boston Globe article today, “Downloads Tranform iPhone into Handy Tool“. The article details useful applications, such as WHERE, which transform your iPhone into much more than simply a device to make calls.

Reporter, Hiawatha Bray reports:

I’m easily lost in the winding streets of Boston, so I like apps that take advantage of the Global Positioning System chip in the new iPhone 3G. One of the best is Where, from Boston-based uLocate Communications Inc. Long available for other GPS-enabled phones, Where can now be installed at no charge on any iPhone.

Some of the other applications mentioned are Air Sharing, Recorder, eReader and Stanza. Click here to read the article in it’s entirety.

More great news for Blackberry users! You can now get WHERE from the newly opened BerryStore (www.berrystore.com). The Berry Store is a downloaded app store just for Blackberry users. It allows users to browse, download, use and review applications right from one slick interface. The store is still in beta, but has been receiving a great deal of buzz. Check it out at www.berrystore.com

Download the Berry Store by visiting www.berrystore.com on your Blackberry device.