4% Use Check-In Services

About four percent of online adults use a service such as Foursquare or Gowalla that allows them to share their location with friends and to find others who are nearby, according to the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life project. On any given day, one percent of Internet users are using these services.

In a May 2010 survey, five percent of adult Internet users said they had used such a site.

Some seven percent of adults who go online with their mobile phone use a location-based service, the report suggests. About eight percent of online adults ages 18 to 29 use location-based services, significantly more than online adults in any other age group.

Gowilla says it has "not yet" been approached by Google about a potential acquisition, though there is some speculation that could be in the offing as Google ramps up its efforts in the social media and social networking areas.