Creepy App Helps You Find "The Ladies." Then What?

By Irin Carmon  |  October 5, 2010 | 8:57pm
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As if to prove The Social Network‘s thesis that much of innovation comes down to dudes trying to score, here is a Foursquare app that zeroes in on critical masses of ladies. Cute or creepy?

The difference between Wheretheladies.at and say, Grindr is that on the latter, gay men opt in on all sides, whereas Wheretheladies.at just uses the Foursquare API to rank places where the most women have checked in. In other words, just having a female-seeming first name (as Techcrunch points out, male Courtneys and the like are shit out of luck) will put you on the radar.

We’re already discussed the reasons many women find Foursquare itself creepy. But at least one woman doesn’t find this use of it that worrisome. Says Alexia Tsotsis over at Techcrunch,

As someone who deals with dorky guys desperate for practice consistently, I think this is brilliant and totally gets an “A” for effort and vision….
Says Trinh, “The few chicks that check-in are a decent sample of where more might be.” Using any female checkins as signifiers of an even larger “lady” ratio, it’s like Trinh and Hodson have totally made an app giving nerds some kind of advantage in natural selection.

Practice at what exactly? Using your phone to be in places where female Foursquare users are getting coffee or picking up groceries? Can it help users know how to talk to women like human beings once they get there?

In other words, the issue here is not physically locating potential partners. It’s the inability of strangers to actually connect, be it due to shyness, low trust levels, or social norms. We’ll be impressed when there’s an app for that.

Wheretheladies.at Shows You Where The Ladies Are At [TechCrunch]
Earlier: When Foursquare Gets Creepy
The Social Network, Where Women Never Have Ideas

Image via GalaxyPhoto/Shutterstock

 
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