Full Paper

Location based social networking applications enable people to share their location with friends for social purposes by “checking in” to places they visit. Prior research suggests that both privacy and impression management motivate location disclosure concerns. In this interview study of foursquare users, we explore the ways people think about location sharing and its effects on impression management and formation. Results indicate that location-sharing decisions depend on the perceived visibility of the check-in, blur boundaries between public and private venues, and can initiate tensions within the foursquare friend network. We introduce the concept of “check-in transience” to explain factors contributing to impression management and argue that sharing location is often used as a signaling strategy to achieve social objectives.