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"If you\u2019re reading this blog, you\u2019ve probably heard the whispers.\r\n\r\n\u201CYeah, Foursquare is growing like crazy, but their retention rate is lousy.\u201D\r\n\r\n\u201CFacebook Places has already won.\u201D\r\n\r\n\u201CNormals are never going to check in.\u201D\r\n\r\nSo  what do you do if you are Foursquare and want to broaden your user base beyond early  adopters and make your service part of the everyday behavior of more  users? \u00A0You fish where the fish are - invest in your APIs, and make it  easy for other services to integrate your functionality.\r\n\r\nThis is exactly what Foursquare did, and the strategy seems to be paying huge dividends in the form of Instagram.\r\n\r\nLet\u2019s look at the numbers.\r\n\r\nInstagram  today announced that they had surpassed 1M users in just two months,  and were processing photos at the rate of three per second.\r\n\r\nAt  current Instagram usage rates, here is a table that shows how many  check-ins (and photos) that Foursquare may be getting access to by  virtue of being the local database of choice for the fast growing  Instagram.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n* assumes 2592000 seconds in a month\r\n\r\nThese are not trivial numbers, folks.\r\n\r\nAnd  this is via one third party developer, that is two months old. \u00A0Where  will Instagram, and by extension Foursquare, be in a year?\r\n\r\nClearly  this is a nice win for Foursquare, and one that is likely moving the  check-in dial far more than some of their big brand partnerships.\r\n\r\nBut  what\u2019s going on here is something much larger. \u00A0It\u2019s the broadening of  the definition of the check-in to include things like taking a photo or  using your Safeway card.\r\n\r\nThere was a recent study by the Pew Research Center that found that only 4% of online Americans have ever checked into a location based service.\u00A0 Here\u2019s what my friend Eghosa Omoigui had to say about that:\r\n\r\n\u201CWrong.  \u00A0Only 4% of Americans know that they\u2019re checking in. \u00A0100% of Americans  check-in. \u00A0When they snap a photo. \u00A0Or use a credit card. \u00A0Or make a  phone call....\u201D\r\n\r\nYou  get the picture. \u00A0By exposing their APIs, Foursquare has begun the work of mapping all sorts of activities to the check in gesture, in  the process vastly broadening their insight into the real world behavior  of consumers.\r\n\r\nAny wonder they are hiring a data scientist?"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://thenextweb.com/insider/2010/12/21/instagram-expands-the-definition-of-a-check-in-with-the-help-of-foursquare-2/>