Hey, I Know Where U R

But if someone else knows that you're within a couple of blocks of them and you ignore them, isn't that a dis?
It's sort of a dis, but I think people understand you can't meet with people all the time. It's also totally acceptable to just say, "I'm going to disappear off the map" [and turn it off].

But maybe your significant other would wonder why you're hiding.
For that very reason, there's a feature in Loopt where you can set your location to appear to the world that you're somewhere different than you actually are. If you want it to appear that you're at the library while you are really somewhere else, you could do that.

You could lie?
For your privacy. This feature came out of a conversation with the National Network to End Domestic Violence. They were saying if a battered wife turned off the feature, the abusive husband would think something's wrong, so people need the ability to look like they're somewhere that they are not.

What do you think is the most legitimate privacy concern for users of location-based services?
It's the unwitting-use scenario. If I've opted in and I'm sharing my location, I at least know I'm doing that. But there's a scenario where someone installs a location-based service on my phone and I don't know about it. If then they can see my location with me being unaware of that, that's very scary. There's a lot we do at Loopt to make sure that doesn't happen.

Are you concerned that a big company like Facebook might build a similar application and crush you?
It's always a concern, but it's hard to launch a service like ours. We hated it while we were going through the initial process, but now we are happy to have the barriers to entry of a built-up network of location-sharing and relationships in place with the carriers.

You dropped out of Stanford to start Loopt. Why is doing a start-up more important than getting a degree?
I felt like if we didn't get started now, it would just be very difficult to catch up with the market leader. I can always go back and finish college.

© 2008