Last year, I wrote about wanting something a bit like dopplr, something to remind me of who is where IRL.

This morning, via John Gruber, I see that Ev Williams is bringing us such a something.

Of course I signed up straight away… have you met me?

At first glance, after first coffee, but still before first light in this part of the world in December, I’m not wild about the implementation. There are a couple of things that make it look like this is only for a certain kind of person, who lives in a certain kind of place and can afford a certain kind of technology. Oh and can afford a certain liberty with their own data and that of their contacts (or as the app has it “their people”). I’m becoming more cynical and sceptical about it the more I write.

As I said last September:

this only works if my friend X in Bogotá is happy to have me share their location. dopplr and foursquare, et al may have let everyone manage their privacy to some extent, but the shortcomings inherent in that privacy model (mainly that it such openness is much much easier for rich white straight dudes than it is for everyone else) meant that most people just couldn’t afford to play.

I don’t want a fully-automated system that only builds the value of my network at the expense of my friends.

Throw in a clumsy use of flags (Good morning, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish friends!). I’m not even sure what that one is. (oh and you’ll need to be on WhatsApp to get the notification.)

Your plans had better be in a code that your friends will understand, as you only have 24 characters.

The granularity of location is the other problem. Letting people know that I’m going to be in “London, UK” isn’t much use. Which points to the use case being international travellers in select cliques for whom London obviously means “my parents place in Primrose Hill”. But if you know people *that* well, are you going to use a separate app for it, or are you going to have a Whatsapp group?

I may also have a chip on my shoulder because my little old iPhone SE won’t show the left and right edges to some screens.

Eh. Will wait and see who else turns up.

PS the wordpress featured image for this post is AI generated and does not represent an accurate representation of the Mozi interface.