The Magazine

New app helps foursquare cheaters

9

on April 24th, 2012

You know that one guy you hate because he sits on top of your foursquare leaderboard with three times as many points as anyone else? You know he’s cheating, but there’s nothing you can do but roll your eyes and move on. There’s a new iPhone  app out this week that’s specifically designed to make that guy’s life easier — and it’s sure to make your frustrations grow even higher.

4sq Hero is an app to make foursquare cheating easier. Plain and simple.

It shows a list of nearby venues and lets the user filter them to find ones they’ve never checked in to before. Why? Because you get more points that way, of course. It takes just one tap to check in and then you’re done, ready to move on the the next venue you’re not really visiting.

The app is so focused on helping users earn points that it comes with a limit on the number you can earn (300) before you have to pay 99 cents for the full version of the app.

Also included in 4sq Hero is a badge list that can be filtered by the ones you have, ones that are retired and ones you don’t have. It doesn’t appear to include any released within the last few months and does nothing to help you earn the ones it does include.

I simply don’t understand the fascination with gaming foursquare’s point system. The points earn you absolutely nothing in the end. There’s no list of “all-time high scores,” so you’ll never get any sort of recognition beyond your own friend list. And for most people that do see it the only recognition is that you’re a cheater.

Don’t get me wrong, I love foursquare points for the streaks they identify and the things they remind me of. Messages like “12 weeks in a row at the gym” or “Welcome back! You haven’t been in Florida since October 2010″ are the reasons I like points, and I feel they’re the reason most users enjoy them. It’s certainly not from the recognition you get from sitting atop the leaderboard, because there just isn’t any to be had.

  • Carlos S

    Another blow to foursquare getting credibility among major companies, specially when they are just about to finally release a “monetization” structure.

  • SCIENCE!

    The cheating friends are easy to deal with… just remove their friendship/followship/etc.

    • UndergroundWire

      But does it really work? Let’s say you and I are friends. I’m a 4sQ cheater so you unfriend me. Great, you don’t have to see my check-ins anymore and now you can be on top of the leader board. But wait, we go to the same places and I hold mayorships in these places. You can’t avoid me. And because I am a big baby, I will steal your mayorships just for the hell of it.

      • SCIENCE!

        I guess the unfriending really works for a specific group of users. I like the push to FB and collect badges… but the leader board and mayorships aren’t that interesting in my opinion.

      • UndergroundWire

        The point is, there is still a way to get underneath your skin. You may not care about badges and mayorships but every time you check in to a venue you frequent, you will always see me.

        They way I see it, I only friend people I know. Why would I want a stranger to see where I am at? What good is unfriending my real friends? Can’t they just brag to you in person about how they have all these badges. All these mayorships?

  • http://www.almediapage.info/ Tom Servo

    Checking in to too many venues? Not a problem for us Android users, we have built-in frustrations to keep from over-using the service. ;)

  • vincent

    I dont really mind the cheaters. I often surpass them when I go on vacation somewhere and gain a huge lead. I say to myself. Take that cheaters!! LOL. But on the serious note, I dont think there is much 4sq can do to deter jumpers/cheaters.

  • Two K

    I have a 4sq friend (“Friend A”) that is a fellow SU. One of “A’s” friends (“Friend B”) sent me a request and I approved it. I started to see that “B” was a cheater, holding down more than a couple Mayorships from checking in at home. “B” also maintained a high-700 point average. I went on a road trip of sorts, passing “B” by about 100 points, and then I called out “B” as a cheater. “B” promptly dumped me from her friend list. After five or six weeks, “B” sent me another request. “A” told me that “B” still cheats, so I won’t be approving that mess a second time. It’s more fun playing at a 200 to 300 point pace than it is showing a cheater the back seat.

    • http://www.almediapage.info/ Tom Servo

      Strange. I recently added a friend of a friend that I didn’t know well, and he too managed to maintain about a 700 point average, far and away exceeding the others in my list. The highest I’ve ever gotten has been in the 500′s and that was with careful dedication to check into every single place I stopped on a business run. After the extra points for first time checkins, I don’t see how someone can maintain such high averages without cheating.

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