Introducing Google Latitude

This post had been put on the 4th of February itself. But due the change in servers it got deleted. So here it is once again.

Today saw the launch of yet another Google product or shall we say service, Google Latitude. This is not a new concept and our very own Nokia already has a similar service. Their service is called Friendview.

This service is available to all the users of Google. If you use Google Maps on your mobile phone, then it should be available to you through an updated version of the application (V3.00 for S60) which has also been released simultaneously today.

The Google Latitude service basically shows your location to your friends. Don’t worry it does not show your location by default to everyone in your list. It will show it to only those you approve.

This means that if your boss is in your contact list, he cannot see where you are, unless you allow him to see your location! Remember you will have to individually invite people from you contact list. The contact list of your Gmail account will be visible to you through the widget, so need of memorizing the addresses. You will also be able to talk to the friends you approve to see your location through Gtalk plugin within the application.

If you want to give it a shot, just go to your ‘iGoogle’ webpage and you will find the Latitude widget already there waiting for you to activate it.

If you want to use this on your phone, then simply go to m.google.com, click ‘More’ and then ‘Maps’ and voila, you will be downloading the latest copy of Google Maps. This copy automatically has the Latitude plugin.

Once installed, just start the application and click ‘Options’ -> ‘Join Latitude’ and enter you Google username and password, the application will do the rest.

You can send me an invite once you are done!

In case you want a step by step visual of how the application works
here is a small video of it.