So you're the one who put this in my heavy rotation screen. Nice, thanks, I dug it too.

but I also often check in at odd times when the business is closed, or as a pre-emptive measure to maintain mayorship. Is this cheating? Yes, I think that's certainly cheating. I'm notifying said bakery immediately... I'm equally convinced that Foursquare, or Gowalla, or something like it will be able to make something happen commercially. While many people are cheating, you have to assume the vast majority are not. They just want to let people know where they are or will be. Many people aren't necessarily even playing a game, they're announcing their location as an announcement to others--this is especially true now that apps can push notifications to the iPhone. The games basically just give you rewards to keep making location announcements. Sponsorships enhance that reward factor--and they don't even have to be financially valuable sponsorships. Imagine if businesses could buy into a certain badge--let's say you get a shamrock badge for visiting every participating Irish pub. Users wouldn't care if the business paid to be part of the badge or not; they just want the badge. Gowalla has missions you can complete, what if businesses had to pay to be part of those? Of course all that is dependent on the userbase growing to the point where it's valuable to a business to participate. Also: Storyville? Goodness. How long has that been tragically closed? Five years? More?