Gowalla

I learned what Gowalla is tonight, and it sounds kind of fun.  I just read the article "Gowalla is the Anti-Farmville" from my Read/Write Web Feed.  The "Farmville" part of the title caught my eye, because although I hardly know what Farmville is, I am constantly annoyed by it.  I hate when I receive facebook notifications that tell me about something someone did on Farmville, or when my feed is full of Farmville news. Sometimes I do feel like the people that spend so much time on this facebook application need to get a life, a point to which the article alluded.  Apparently Gowalla is like Farmville in that it is a game played within a social network site setting, but unlike Farmville, it actually involves going out and about in the real world. Apparently participants in this game earn "badges" for visiting different real-life locations, kind of like stamps in a passport. Apparently there are other games similiar Gowalla out there, like one called Foursquare. I didn't know these types of games existed, but I definitely like the way they encourage people to be active.