The coolest thing about earning foursquare badges is that they’re completely free. You simply check in at the places you visit and occasionally you’ll be rewarded with “digital candy.”
One determined group of 50 foursquare jumpers — users who digitally “jump” around the globe solely to unlock badges — has proven just how dedicated they are to their craft, though, by essentially buying one of foursquare’s hardest-to-get badges. In the end, their desperate play to grab a badge netted about $250 for charity.
The badge in question was the American Express Swiped @ SXSW badge. It was cleverly designed to be unlocked only by users who actually swiped their linked American Express cards in Austin during SXSW. While most badges can be obtained with relative ease by checking in to the right places — using methods I won’t detail here — this badge proved nearly impossible for the jumpers to earn since it required an American Express card and physically swiping it in Austin.
Through what I can only imagine was a rather expensive trial and error process, this group of jumpers determined that by making the minimum $5 online donation to Austin’s Capital Area Food Bank of Texas they could trick American Express and foursquare into believing they’d actually used their cards in Austin.
John Turner, a spokesman for the food bank, says they received about $250 worth of the $5 donations on Monday. Most came from countries like Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand — all places known for having a high number of jumpers. Turner noted that the gifts made up a small percentage of their annual online donations, but added that they’re “certainly not going to turn them away.”
The roughly 10,000 jumpers make up a tiny percentage of the foursquare population, yet they account for a majority of the unlocked badges since their goal is to collect every badge as it is released. The practice rankles many foursquare users since the jumpers aren’t actually making the effort to visit places to earn the badges — going against foursquare’s “get out and explore your city” mantra.
Even the most hardcore opponents of jumping would be hard-pressed to find fault in the jumpers’ methods in this case. When the result is a positive for a charity like the Capital Area Food Bank of Texas, everyone wins.
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#1 by Dean T. on March 17, 2011 - 5:01 pm
I’m glad that something good finally came of what can be described as nothing else but cheating. At least a charity got some money out of it, though if there was ever a time for the whole “jumper” population to try and get a badge, this should’ve been the one.
I’ve always stood firm that their whole defense of “playing by different rules” is just a fancy way of side-stepping the cheating aspect of it. If there are rules and a specific intent for a service and you ignore that and do it your own way, it’s cheating. Plain and simple. Nobody gets hurt, blah blah blah. :-p Still wish that the mobile check-ins wouldn’t open badges either. In this day and age, smart phones and data aren’t that expensive anymore. You wanna play the game, do it the way it was meant to be done.
#2 by akaCarioca on March 19, 2011 - 3:04 pm
You have addressed in the best way possible.
The worst blind is the one that refuses to see.
#3 by Robert Aitchison on March 17, 2011 - 5:33 pm
As much as I’m annoyed by jumpers I won’t complain about this. Wonder if other groups will intentionally set up donate to charity and get 4SQ badges in the future, I suppose companies could do so too.
#4 by Mex on March 17, 2011 - 6:03 pm
Good on them, with any luck this will shut the whingers up for a little while. I’m not a jumper myself but jumpers don’t bother me in the slightest (unlike the idiots constantly complaining about them). Despite some very creative explanations of how jumping is evil, I’ve yet to see any that actually hold water, this however is hard evidence of jumpers doing some good. I hope this and many other charities continue/start to make extra money this way
#5 by Robert Aitchison on March 17, 2011 - 6:48 pm
FYI, jumpers were mayors of many of the SXSW related special venues before SXSW even opened. There have been other documented cases where jumpers have taken mayorships instead of people who actually visit particular venues.
I try not to complain too much about them but I don’t think it’s realistic to argue that their behavior does not negatively effect other Foursquare users who use the system the way it was intended.
#6 by Mex on March 17, 2011 - 7:08 pm
So it’s the jumpers fault 4sq started handing out mayorship’s to special events too soon?
Recently a jumper too one of my normal mayorship’s (quite possibly more than one, but this was a local pub so I noticed LOL). How is that any different to somebody who was physically there taking it or it just staying with me? I made a point of dropping in (and spending money) more often to get it back. Due to the jumper, this venue has made more money. Like I said the arguments against them just don’t hold water.
#7 by anthonydpaul on March 17, 2011 - 8:59 pm
It isn’t any different than HealthMonth requiring a $50 membership to acquire the other three badges. Sure, you could be gifted the three months from someone else, but that someone else would have had to pay.
#8 by Chris Thompson on March 17, 2011 - 9:09 pm
That’s a good point. I forgot about the HealthMonth badges, but I think those are only $5 not $50.
#9 by anthonydpaul on March 17, 2011 - 10:23 pm
Well, $5 individually. $50 for the year. I figured I may as well use it.
#10 by Mike on March 17, 2011 - 9:44 pm
OK, not for nothing.. but who really cares about people who “jump”…Seriously.. this is just a game and it is not cheating since you do not win $$$$$$$$$… LOL…. I laugh at the people who actually get pissed off at peop[le who jump to get badges…. ha ha
#11 by Capolista on March 17, 2011 - 11:39 pm
if it isn’t because of jumpers united together supported by #k4squs, #IJU, #AJI & #4sqTHAI .. there won’t be ten-gallon swarms unlock in sxsw event this year .. trust me !! so i should say peoples who really attending sxsw event, have to thanked jumpers because of ten-gallon swarms badge they earned
#12 by blueberie on March 18, 2011 - 12:08 am
if you are badge collector, you must be a jumper, coz impossible you’re collect all badges without jump into the venue, or else you’re a billionaire and you can do real check-in there.
If you feel annoyed of jumper’s act, like being mayorships, it’s all because not all of us obey the rules. We’re committed not to leave any tips, and not to try ousted mayorships, if not actually in that location, but AFAIK, newbie jumpers often break the rules we have made.
Really sorry if jumpers annoying you. and for the SXSW venue, don’t worry, after the event is finish, we will come home and ready for hunting badge in other location.
#13 by slush... on March 18, 2011 - 4:41 am
Nice… LOL. (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ ★ CHEERS ★ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ
#14 by sam on March 18, 2011 - 5:45 am
one question? why worried about jumper anyway? they not going to get any special offer by unlocking the badge. tell u the truth acctually we (i) get a lot of benefit from jumper. i know that the LV badge is re-active again from jumper, and with that information i can unlock the badge legally by drive there. so for me personally i dont care if jumper exist in 4sq. and 4sq should give them credit by making a special badge or something for them, as them giving a time and effort to unlocking those badges.
#15 by slush... on March 18, 2011 - 6:37 am
Fair enough mate. Nice!!! Like this.. (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ ★ CHEERS ★ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ (̐̉̉̉_̐̉̉̉)ɔ
#16 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 7:53 am
Just fyi, mobile web check ins can no longer earned mayorship. So the mayors probably did a real check ins to get the mayorship.
#17 by anthonydpaul on March 18, 2011 - 8:25 am
“Real check-ins” is a misnomer. Only the mobile web has that designation, but I wrote my own mobile web version using the API and if I wanted to, I could use it to get mayorships…even without geolocation.
However, even that is not what the jumpers are using. All you need is a jailbroken iPhone or iPod, then to install one of several geolocation fakers where you set your own coordinates, to which your apps all sync.
#18 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 8:52 am
True, but if found out by foursquare, mayorship check ins will be disabled from that self written API hosting.
#19 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 8:16 am
Just for information, jumpers community have some rules that they follow as requested by foursquare. They are committed not to gain any mayorship overseas. They are committed not to leave any comments or inappropriate comments on any venue overseas. They are jumping just strictly to collect badges. Every new jumpers who joined the community are always reminded to read the rules in their forum. And they are always happy to share any tips on how to unlock a badge.
#20 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 8:24 am
Just for information, jumpers community have some rules that they follow as requested by foursquare. They are committed not to gain any mayorship overseas. They are committed not to leave any comments or inappropriate comments on any venue overseas. They are jumping just strictly to collect badges. Every new jumpers who joined the community are always reminded to read these rules in their forum. And they are always happy to share any tips on how to unlock a badge.
#21 by Ben on March 18, 2011 - 12:00 pm
>Everyones face when without the jumpers NO one could have gotten SxSW’s Ten Gallon Swarm Badge.
#22 by akaCarioca on March 18, 2011 - 12:44 pm
I wrote the text below, is response to some people asking me why “jumpers” are not good for businesses, users and Foursquare.
“Is it a game, social network, loyalty program or platform??
I have worked in IT (Mainframes, not PC or Internet) for over 20 years and several buzz words have come up in hardware (servers, blades, etc) and software (OO, SOA, Cloud, etc). One of the most interesting for me is LBS (Location Based Services), which has Foursquare as a good example.
Foursquare is an application that you can use in 2 ways:
• Using your smartphone (Blackberry, Iphone, Android, etc);
• Using the internet
Most people that I know, use it on the phone, where the app uses the phone’s GPS feature to tell you about venues near you. That can be any place: a bar, a school, a mall, a park, etc.
A growing number of people use the website where you just enter the address which you want to check-ins. This is done without any GPS verification that you are really in there.
By doing check-ins, you can earn mayorship (when you are the person with most check-ins in that venue) and badges (When you visit a gym 10x, 20 different pizza places, etc). You can also leave tips about such venues (Like “Nice chili on Thursdays”) and review these tips before you
visit the venue. Because of these mayorships and badges, business owners can offer specials like free appetizer for the mayor or a discount for a given badge. This might have started as a game and people felt good about their mayor status and badges. Like any game, Foursquare has rules and those that cheat on it, are called jumpers. They are the people that became very competitive and found out that they could use the website app right at their couch, check-in all over the world and earn mayorships/badges. There is where I have a problem…
I understand using the web app when you don’t have your phone with you or maybe you have a bad connection (It happened to me in NY using ATT), but abusing it, is really unfair for business, users and Foursquare.
Foursquare is a company looking to make money and businesses are trying to attract new customers and keep the old ones by offering the specials. That can only be good for a business if a person actually visits the venue, why? Can you do the following using the website without being physically at the venue?
1) Tell how good the seafood restaurant in downtown is?
2) Tell how nice the nurse at the local hospital is?
3) Describe how comfortable the movie theater in the mall is?
Nope, these are kind of feedback that you can only have by visiting the venue in person and experiencing it! Besides, these business are paying Foursquare some money to have their unique badges and also rely on the data (check-ins, tips, etc) created by users, to determine their strategies (New services, new branches, etc). The business model for Foursquare has changed from a game to a social media and with the increased number of business partnering with them, they the business will be looking for their ROI and questioning if things don’t add up. How?
For example: American Express just signed a major deal with Foursquare, in hopes to attract that younger (30 and below) crowd. They will pay nothing to Foursquare (at least in the beginning) and run specials like spend $5 save $5 in Austin. Assuming that they expect 2000 check-ins, what happens if half of those are from jumpers? How accurate can be the numbers provided by Foursquare vs the projected revenue? No matter how you see it or call it, data mining, data aggregation, data analytics, etc, market data always is more important than product/service data and this is the kind of data that businesses need to make important decisions and that Foursquare needs in order to offer better services. With the new version 3.0, they are combining their gigantic database of information with new algorithms to suggest you “places” based on where you are, where you have been, what you have liked, what your friends have liked, etc, almost in a predictive check-in. This greatly improves the value/experience of the service for users in the same way that paves the way for more business to get involved and use Foursquare as the de facto loyalty program. With so much data, businesses and users involved, can you really call it just a game?!? I would call a platform in the making!
Jumpers take away pride from real users, deceive businesses and Foursquare on the real data and prevent both from reaching the ROI that they first predicted based on the check-ins.
I used to say that a badge does not represent who I am, but after a while, I believe that it does, depending on how you “earned” that badge.
#23 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 3:16 pm
I will give you a simple answer. If accurate data is needed by partners, I’m sure foursquare can filter the database to show real GPS verified check ins and filter out those web check ins. With your background in IT surely you know this could easily be done. Have you ever thought probably foursquare themselves is interested in having data on how many jumpers out there. What countries they are from, how fast they are growing. From these data, foursquare could probably draw up a plan to benefit from these jumpers. And what’s the future holds for foursquare in those countries. These are also data that is useful to have.
As for taking mayorship and leaving comments, foursquare made a written request to all jumpers to avoid that and they are all trying their best to stick to that request.
#24 by Mex on March 18, 2011 - 4:18 pm
Again more explanations that just don’t hold water. You say Jumpers are stopping business make money, read a post I made a little further up and you will see how profits for a local pub went up when I was getting my mayorship back from a jumper. Had they not taken it I wouldn’t have made the effort to visit more frequently (and spend money while I was there).
Same goes for mayorship offers. If the mayor is entitled to say a free pizza each day/week but the mayor is on the other side of the planet, the business saves money as the freebies go uncollected.
Jumpers are good for business, not bad as the whingers would love people to think.
Most of the people I know who aren’t jumpers (basically everybody I know who doesn’t live in SE Asia) will still check into places they are passing, I know several people who have the Starbucks badge but rarely if ever actually drink coffee, let alone Starbucks coffee. Just because they are standing in the street outside a business in my eyes at lest is no different from being in a different country, yet the whingers almost never call for these ‘cheats’ to be executed.
Also on several occasions while visiting friends who are jumpers, when I mention a city/country I’ll soon be visiting they will tell me about cool places they have jumped to. Sometime I know of the place, but often I don’t and if it’s not far off my route I will pop in. So not only are businesses making/saving money due to jumpers, they are getting free advertising too. no wonder the whingers are so upset LOL
#25 by akaCarioca on March 18, 2011 - 4:48 pm
One thing is for sure, your concept of business/rules/values, are really disconnected from others, which is fine with me, based on free speech.
“Also on several occasions while visiting friends who are jumpers, when I mention a city/country I’ll soon be visiting they will tell me about cool places they have jumped to.”
If they jumped to these places, how can they tell how cool these places are?!?! By just reading tips?
I respectfully rest my case.
#26 by Gregorio Feliciano on March 18, 2011 - 3:06 pm
Well when I think about it I spent $10 on foursquare badges because I had to pay two of my months for Health Month last year.
#27 by akaCarioca on March 18, 2011 - 3:25 pm
I am sure Foursquare can filter the check-ins and determine what is real and what is fake.
At the end of the day, “jumpers” are bending the rules with the argument that “we can’t be in USA for a real check-ins”. Unfortunately, most “jumpers” only see it as a a game and not as business, which is where I have concerns, nothing personal, just business.
#28 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 4:13 pm
It definitely is business for foursquare. Which do you think is better? Well known in US only and having all their users based in US only or being well known world wide and being a world wide brand. A good thing in business is to get the whole world attention. And that’s exactly what foursquare is doing. You probably haven’t heard of Koprol which is similar to foursquare and it’s available in Indonesia. If there are no badges and no jumpers, foursquare would probably used in US only just like Koprol in Indonesia only.
#29 by anthonydpaul on March 18, 2011 - 3:42 pm
Not if your phone thinks it is real.
Setting up your own API call without passing coordinates? Sure. However, if your device is jailbroken and you are spoofing your GPS coordinates, your device apps behave precisely as they normally do…but they think they are in a different place.
A legitimate check-in from the official 4sq app, regardless of the coordinates given to the app being real or fake is going to output a legitimate check-in indistinguishable from any other (with exception of flagged unrealistic travel distances).
In the end, 4sq has an open API for developers to build upon. That level of integration prevents 4sq from being able to (or wanting to) enforce too much control over the ecosystem. The hackable nature is what makes it appealing in different ways to different people, just like Twitter and Facebook encouraging development.
#30 by anthonydpaul on March 18, 2011 - 3:45 pm
Irrelevant. Using the API for check-ins isn’t a breach of the TOS, even if another user thinks it is unethical. The very point of having an API is to bend it.
Besides, even if the API was removed entirely, it doesn’t change the device-level challenge of coordinates being spoofed. See other reply:
http://aboutfoursquare.com/how-much-would-you-pay-for-a-foursquare-badge/comment-page-1/#comment-34124
#31 by comment on March 18, 2011 - 4:18 pm
Jumpers have a few hosting sites that run self-written API to do check-ins and most of these hosting sites have been disabled for mayorship.
#32 by LiteSalt on March 18, 2011 - 3:46 pm
I’m not sure how it happened, but I signed up with my American Express card hoping that the pilot would extend past SXSW. I was alerted VERY early one morning that I got the Swiped badge, and I was nowhere near Austin at the time.
#33 by Mex on March 18, 2011 - 5:02 pm
My point is without a tip off from a jumper these places would not have made any money from me, I rest my case. (And I will ignore your personal attack on my character).
#34 by akaCarioca on March 18, 2011 - 5:50 pm
If you point out where I attacked you, I’ll gladly apologize, however, I don’t think that calling those that do not support “jumpers” as “whingers” is any flattery. My replies ares based solely on what you write here and I don’t have any pretension that I am this “know it all”.
Still, I don’t see how a jumper can give ANY feedback without being at the venue.
Can we agree that we both can disagree from each other and that in the same way, we owe respect to ourselves and the other people giving their opinions?
#35 by Mex on March 18, 2011 - 6:09 pm
If only the tips part of 4sq that was of any importance I don’t think it would not have a fraction of the members it currently does.
I do however agree that we are not likely to change each others opinion on this. I have listed reasons (and evidence) that I feel defeats arguments against jumpers. I can’t see any way jumpers are doing any harm. You are of the mindset they do cause harm. not much more to discuss on the matter.
After all, there are more important things than this that need fixing with 4sq, the numerous venue duplicate, editing rights for mayor, etc. all come to mind.
#36 by gravijha4s. on March 18, 2011 - 10:17 pm
We colected badge just for fun. Just for hobbies..not for earn offer. Cause at my homecountry.. There is no badge like in the USA. Or many different country. We jump for collect badge. Thats all. …
#37 by gravijha4s. on March 18, 2011 - 10:20 pm
We colected badge just for fun. Just for hobbies..not for earn offer. Cause at my homecountry.. There is no badge like in the USA. Or many different country. We jump for collect badge. Thats all. … We spend a lot of time too. Wake all night for sure. There about 3pm. My location was 3am ..is earlier morning…. Take a break for work… Always focus at my phone. For get a badge. However.. We still jump around.. Even just a virtual cek in.
#38 by Chris Thompson on March 19, 2011 - 9:30 am
There are still plenty of badges that are available worldwide, though. And jumpers still jump for those, even when they can be earned in their own backyards. That’s the thing I don’t understand.
#39 by comment on March 19, 2011 - 10:44 am
because traveling back and forth between US and Indonesia takes more than 20 hrs according to flight time at http://www.travelmath.com. If you jump between countries, you can’t immediately check in and get a badge. You have to wait for the travel time or else you will get rapid check in message with no points and no badge.
#40 by comment on March 19, 2011 - 1:52 am
Why would you need feedback on a venue from jumpers? Feedback from jumpers on a venue are not important and of no use. Jumpers don’t give any feedback on a venue. It serves no purpose to them and foursquare. Which is why foursquare requested jumpers not to leave any feedback comments and majority of jumpers are abiding by this request. Just think of it this way, jumpers check ins just for badges nothing else. No feedback and no mayorship. Real check ins get badges, able to leave feedback and gain mayorship. Just seperate this 2 communities and you get 2 seperate data and results without interfering with each other.
#41 by Mex on March 19, 2011 - 11:37 am
On the subject of feedback, even most people who are physically at a location don’t leave feedback. At one point I was the mayor of over a hundred venues (the power of being an early adopter LOL), I’ve left feedback on well under half that number of venues in total, and the number of places I’ve checked into without being mayor must be huge (I’ve just checked my stats on the 4sq site, but cant see a way of finding this out exactly, it tells check-ins but not unique venues). I know loads of (non-jumping) people who have never left a tip.
Not adding much to the discussion here I admit LOL but as a few people are talking about jumpers and feedback I thought it worth pointing out.
#42 by Bill on March 19, 2011 - 11:08 am
it’s a win – win solution