http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/403

Finally Facebook has entered into the “Location based services” market, choosing to partner with, rather than compete with Foursquare, Gowalla and Yelp.

Currently location based services are very much a niche product, with only a tiny (albeit growing number) of people using it.  Describing Foursquare for example, to someone who doesn’t get technology for technologies sake is an exercise in futility and quite frankly makes you sound like a bit of a loser (“No, but you don’t get it, you get BADGES and can be the mayor and stuff…”).

Facebook’s foray into this area is exciting because of its 500 million+ users who will now become familiar with it, regardless of whether they want to.

It will be interesting to see how these services are received by “normal” people over the next few weeks.

No doubt it will prove yet another way of distracting yourself from socializing in real life.