I'm a recent convert to the phenomenon of the smart phone so I guessed that, while I was an early adopter of blogging, I was late to the Foursquare party. Apparently not.

I totally know what you mean about it lacking, well, something. I find I only have to check-in to a place once or twice, and I'm the mayor. And, umm, that's it. Like you say, I've never received an offer, I've never seen a place 'use' Foursquare creatively to promote themselves - and unlike you, I've never even had a beer courtesy of Foursquare.

So yes, I like the suggestions. Foursquare needs to do something. I particularly like the idea of Foursquare hiring people to help business get the most out of it.

They can't just create a network and expect it to happen. That's the kind of thing I keep telling my clients they can't do, and FourSquare should know better.

Oh the humanity!

This slots SO neatly into a post I was considering writing recently. I get tired of reading how much people hate 'gurus'. Which is fine, but what I've found is that gurus never actually call themselves gurus. It's *other* people who proudly display us and say "Here's our web/writing/html/css/social media guru", as if we're some sort of bird in a cage. Or, in my case, gorilla.

So, that's gurus dealt with. Now, about the words you don't like. I don't like them either. But you know where they're most prevalent? Yep. PR. I remember when I first walked into a PR agency. Within an hour I was mystified by the strange talk of touchpoints and holism. There was leverage-a-plenty, and stakeholders littered the floor.

So I really don't think it's fair to single out social media 'gurus' for this nonsense. Long words strongly spoken has always been the tactic of people who don't really know what they're talking about. And really, we didn't mean to be called gurus. You started it!

Hey, thanks for the link! I should add that I'm a Brendan, not a Brendon. It's important, as copywriters, to make sure we spell people's names correctly!