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Connecting with people, finding places liked by friends and tracking personal travel habits over time were listed as the primary reasons people who use location based social networks like Facebook Places, Foursquare and Google Latitude do so in a survey published by Portland, Oregon digital marketing firm White Horse. The firm surveyed 437 smartphone owners and found that discounts and gaming were not seen as significant motivators for the use of location services. (Lost in Geolocation: Why Consumers Haven't Bought it and How Marketers Can Fix It)

56% of smartphone owners surveyed said they knew about these services and 39% of respondents said they used them. Facebook Places was the clear leader among users (42%) with Latitude (27%) and Foursquare (25%) tied somewhere behind. The biggest barriers to use among non-users? Privacy concerns and lack of clear benefit. Graphs below.

What does the next generation of location based social networking look like? Unless something shocking comes up, it's probably going to look like this: persistent location tracking, recommendations and deals based on personal location history and selective location sharing with friends. Those are things someone is going to nail and probably sometime soon.

One young startup called HipGeo thinks it can do it. Founded and advised by a very strong team, including some early Yahoo people, HipGeo has described itself as "Mint.com for your location" (cool!) and is in fundraising mode now. No launch date has been disclosed yet, but the information available online so far about the company indicates that this is one you'll want to keep an eye on.

Google Latitude, the search giant's mobile location service, has announced this morning that it is adding the ability to check in to specific places to its Android and iPhone apps. Android users will be able to check in automatically, using two brand new, different and very interesting methods. Latitude has now been live for 2 years and Google says it has 10 million monthly users, making it much more popular than the more high-profile startups in this space.

Why is Google working on mobile location tracking and sharing? It's all about search and relevance. "Our idea is to organize the world's information and part of that is location," Latitude's Ken Norton told us. "Location is a vector against which all factors and metrics will be considered."

Almost two years after announcing Latitude, Google's entry into the location sharing market, Apple and Google have finally come together to offer an official native Latitude app on the iPhone. And it's a real let-down.

Location technology is incredibly hot right now, innovation is happening fast and furious, the sky's the limit, but the Latitude app is a clumsy and severely limited piece of software that's only likely to appeal to unsophisticated customers who don't know any better. (Update: A commenter rightly told me this is an arrogant and inappropriate choice of words. I apologize.) It represents the latest missed opportunity by Google and just more fuel for the fire for critics who assert that it "doesn't get social technology."

Google has updated Google Maps for Android and is launching Google Maps 4.6 this morning. The latest edition of Google Maps for Android comes with updates to Place page reviews, upgraded search filters and an option to view you and your friends' locations in real-time, using Google Latitude.

Although the emphasis of much location-based technology has been on its mobile implementation - the ability to stay updated on whereabouts when you're out-and-about - there's still a place for desktop uses.

And with that in mind, Google has updated Google Latitude so that you can both see where your friends are as well as share your own location.

The phrase "Internet of Things" got to be an overused misnomer even before the technology had a chance to become common, but at least we're on to everyday use cases: a developer has arranged for his thermostat to turn on when he's home and switch off when he leaves.

Hans Scharler's thermostat keeps dibs on his location, the outside temperature and the temperature inside the house, and decides when to kick on the air conditioning or heat.

Google announced today that its location based social network Latitude is now available in-browser on the iPhone and many iPhone owners will no doubt give it a try. We'd recommend you check it out and then promptly download the app for Brightkite, a startup in the same sector. Brightkite is so full featured it makes Latitude look like a frustrating joke.

Much has been written already today about Apple's insistence that Latitude be accessed through the browser, instead of as a downloaded app. That's hardly the only thing wrong with it. So far, it's just plain terrible. Here's why.

After publishing her book about social capital and the power of social networking,The Whuffie Factor, Tara Hunt is doing what any change agent does. She's changing. She's quit her job, purchased a winnebago and coerced five friends to karaoke across the country with her. Wuffaoke Or Bust is a cross-country road trip where six crooners and one pug will live stream their 13-city karaoke tour from San Francisco to Montreal. Think of it as a Rental Car Rally with a talent competition or Bullrun Rally with geeks instead of "petrolsexuals."

Google released two new features today for its Google Latitude location-sharing service. You can now put a public location badge with your current location on your blog or web site, and you can now automatically update your Google Talk status with your current location as well. For Blogger users, Google provides a one-click install option for the public badge. Both the public badge and the Google Talk app are currently only available in the US.