What is Google Latitude? finding friends location

Google introduced its new service called Google Latitude. This is a more of a mobile device service. You can visit http://google.com/latitude and share your location with your friends. With Google Latitude you can easily see where your friends are right now, you can contact them via SMS, IM or Phone call.

With this new Google service you can now share your location with your friends and can also see their location in real time. At the backend this service uses Google Maps to track down the location of your friends. It checks you and your friend’s location via GPS Receiver which is builtin in some new mobile handsets. The service is free from Google but your mobile service provider may charge you (depending on the your package) for the GPRS Internet. Oh yea! not to forget this service is not yet available for the Apple iPhone users 🙁

Ok with these above pictures you must have noticed something in the third image. Yes! Its getting something like Twitter. You can share your location and then you can talk with your friends, Share Status! Wow I never thought Twitter will shake everyone (Microsoft, Google and Facebook) and finally everyone is starting a service similar to Twitter.

If you are not on your mobile phone, then so what? You can use Google Gear. Google Gears is a software that detects wireless signals and detects where your computer is. (But Google Gear is for the use in United States only.)

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Supported Mobile Phones:

Google Latitude is available on the following mobile devices wherever Google Maps for mobile v3.0 and above is supported:

• Android-powered devices with Maps v3.0 and above. G1 users in the US will be receiving Maps v3.0 in a system update soon.
• Most color BlackBerry devices.
• Most Windows Mobile 5.0 and above devices. Note: Some Windows Mobile devices don’t support cell-ID location detection.
• Most Symbian S60 devices

Coming soon!

• iPhone and iPod touch devices with the Google Mobile App (in the US).
• Many Sony Ericsson devices.

Note: Some older versions of these devices cannot support Google Maps for mobile version 3.0 and above and will receive the most recent compatible version without Google Latitude.

Is My Country Supported?

Well, Google Latitude is supported in some selected limited countries. The listed countries are : Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Itlay, Liechtenstein, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, United Kingdom, United States.

Requirements?

You just need to have Google Maps 3 with Latitude installed on your Mobile Phone or Google Gears on your computer.

Via [Google Latitude/Google Gears]