Marni Soupcoff on Loopt: A service loners will want to avoid

Cell Phone Cleaner Facebook may be a "social networking" site, but it's also a goodtool for those with social anxiety or a desire to keep tothemselves. It lets these folks keep their friends and loved onesapprised of their news without having to meet up in person. Peoplewho are shy can get comfortable with newer acquaintances before thestress of face to face interaction. So, I'm sure some hermits loveFacebook as much as social butterflies do. The same surely can't be said for Loopt, a Facebook-like service that goes a step further by alerting youwhen your friends are in close physical proximity (and, by the sametoken, sharing your physical location with your friends). So, ifyou're at the Starbucks at Yonge and Eglinton, you can check out a"friend map" on your cell phone and see which of yourpals is nearby (browsing at the HMV across the street, steppingonto the subway platform below your feet, going for a run at thepark a couple blocks away). But what if you're enjoying sippingyour latte solo? It's true, you can hide your location. But willfriends become suspicious if you're always rendering your locationinvisible? And do you really want even your nearest and dearest tobe able to keep track of your every trip to the dry cleaner anddentist? Or, God forbid, the therapist or the gynecologist? I'm skeptical that there is an appetite for the level ofinformation Loop provides. Sure, Loopt's site boasts that the service allows you to "receiveautomatic alerts when [your friends are] nearby so that you nevermiss an opportunity to meet." But isn't missing someopportunities to meet essential to living a calm and balanced life(even if you're not a hermit)? Isn't there such a thing as being alittle too connected? ("Hey, Max, I see you're at the publicwashroom over at Fifth and Main! I'm like two minutes away -- let's meet up!") Who wants their spousemonitoring their trips to McDonald's drive-thrus? Or their friendsnagging them for not visiting when they were "just around thecorner"? Then again, I thought Facebook sounded inane when I first heard about and I'm now I'm on thereevery day, so I'll have to wait and see how things go if and when Loopt becomes available on Canadian cell phone carriers. Still, like Isaid, this is not product that is going to appeal to loners.