What is Google Latitude ?
Google Maps has gone social!
Through latitude Google allows their users to share their location with other users in their contact list. Originally it was created as a location aware mobile app, it allows a mobile phone user to allow other people that they have in their contact list to track their location, although now people can use latitude without the need of a mobile phone.
Through your own iGoogle account the location of your cellphone is mapped in Google Maps, you can control the details and the accuracy of how much can another user see for privacy issues. Your location is not broadcasted to the general public, users that want to share their location with other people in their contact list must activate latitude and allow each other to access or see locations and data. You will be able to log off latitude at any moment, you just have to turn location sharing off.
But really, think about it, how often would you like to find out what your friends or your family are up to, where they are, what are they doing, and stuff like that. Now you can easily find out all of these things by simply accessing your Google latitude account.
One of the coolest things about latitude is that you can easily comunicate with the people in your contact list, you can do it by phone, text messaging, or instant messaging. Remember, latitude was originally created as a mobile phone app, but it is an iGoogle gadget for your computer as well.
How to Use Google Latitude ?
Its simple just visit Google latitude.
It was obvious that with this kind of feature Google would receive complaints about people concerned with privacy issues, but as you probably know by now Google is smart, so they launched the service with privacy features already in place. It is a great tool to keep in touch and to be a little bit closer of your friends and family by allowing them to easily spot you, with this feature you can also allow the people in your contact list to know when you are in their area, if you don’t want them to know then just turn your sharing location off.
Using this feature you can set your location manually, or if you prefer automatically using Google Gears, if you want download it and install it in your browser, I will talk about Gears later to explain to you what it is about but for now all I can say is that you should download it.
By sharing your location with your contacts you will allow them to see your exact location if you want to, you can also limit what they see and only allow them to see the city where you are instead of the exact place. Latitude is already available in more than 27 countries because Google wants everyone to use this feature, they are constantly including the service in new countries.
Latitude is Google’s social location service!
Which Mobile Phones Are Compatible With Google Latitude ?
- Blackberry
- S60
- Windows Mobile
- Android
- Iphone
- Ipod Touch
Remember that you can also access latitude even if you do not have a mobile phone, as I’ve said before you can visit Google latitude to install the gadget on your desktop or laptop to share your location right from your computer.
Check out the video demonstration of Google Latitude!
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