Twitter to add hooks for location awareness
updated 05:50 pm EDT, Thu August 20, 2009
Twitter Location API Soon
Twitter today publicly unveiled efforts to add location features to its app programing interface (API). The new code will let developers of apps, including on the web and on GPS-aware mobile devices like the iPhone, add the latitude and longitude coordinates of the user with any tweet. While developers of apps like Tweetie or Twinkle have often added location data themselves, the new feature would make it possible to see nearby tweets in any app.
Company co-founder Biz Stone has stressed privacy and that positioning will be strictly optional, requiring that developers or users agree to sending their locations with posts. A timetable isn't yet available for the release, but Twitter plans to deliver the API to outside developers before adding it to its own desktop and mobile-oriented web pages.
