locationsharing
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Apple's Find My Friends app now available
In advance of iOS 5, Apple has released Find My Friends, a location sharing app similar to Glympse. As the name implies, Find My Friends will let you locate your friends on a map. It'll also let you share your location so your friends can find you. For those concerned about privacy, the location sharing feature can be turned on permanently or only temporarily which is great for when you want your friends to meet you while you're eating dinner at a local restaurant, but not when you go home. It's also conveniently integrated with the built-in contact and map applications so you can find your friends and generate a route to meet up with them. You can install Find My Friends by visiting iCloud.com on an iPhone running iOS 5. You can also download it from the App Store. [Via Macstories]
Palm files patent for GPS-based location sharing service
Palm users looking to be a little more social may not have to wait much longer, as a new patent filing reveals that the company may be working on a Google Latitude-esque location sharing service for their devices. According to the patent, a user would be notified if another user is in the proximity of another one, and it makes mention of sharing location information to social networking sites. Additionally, it alludes to location based reminders, such as reminding you to pick up milk if you're at or near a grocery store. If this sounds familiar, that's because Apple filed a patent for a similar sounding location sharing service very recently. Let's just hope this doesn't lead to another legal spat between the two companies, because it could get pretty ugly, pretty fast... again.
Google Latitude coming to other devices, iPhone included
T-Mobile's decision to bundle Google's Latitude location-tracking service into the RC33 G1 update may have gotten all the attention this morning, but if you've got a BlackBerry, Window Mobile or S60 device, you can start oversharing right away -- Latitude is built into the newest version of the Google Maps app. Not only that, but it looks like iPhone owners will be able to get in on the fun soon -- Google says it's working on a Latitude app that will "hopefully" be available shortly. We're guessing that means El Goog is tied up in App Store approval shenanigans -- it's certainly been naughty before -- but what we're really wondering is if the next rev of Apple's Maps app will include Latitude, since it's basically just a really nice Gmaps implementation. We're guessing the developers of Loopt and Whrrl are equally eager to find out -- "duplication of functionality," anyone?
