Plazes Survey Results
For a university project we researched location-based services and how they can improve social interaction. As part of the research we conducted a survey under 23 Plazes users, all contacts of mine. The results are from March 12th, 2007.
In short, Plazes is a web service which tracks the location of their users via software applications those users run on their machines, a mobile phone application and SMS “check-ins”. A location is called a Plaze, a location history a Traze. The software application uses the identity of the network router as an identifier for the Plaze.
Here are the questions asked and the results.
How long have you been using Plazes? (Check one)
(A) 3 years (39%)
(B) 2 years (30%)
(C) 1 year (17%)
(D) Less than 1 year (13%)What Plazer services do you use? (Check at least one)
(*) The Plazer application (91%)
(*) The Phone application (13%)
(*) SMS (26%)
(*) None (8%)How many Plazes did you discover? (Check one)
(A) 0 - 10 (39%)
(B) 11 - 20 (4%)
(C) 21 - 30 (17%)
(D) 31 - 40 (0%)
(E) 41 - 50 (13%)
(F) 51 or more (26%)How many contacts do you have? (Check one)
(A) 0 - 10 (21%)
(B) 11 - 20 (30%)
(C) 21 - 30 (13%)
(D) 31 - 40 (13%)
(E) 41 - 50 (4%)
(F) 51 or more (17%)In what situations do you use Plazes? (Check at least one)
(*) At conferences and other events (17%)
(*) At home (8%)
(*) At work (8%)
(*) Wherever I am (26%)
(*) I don’t actually use it (17%)Is your Traze public? (Check one)
(*) Yes (69%)
(*) No (31%)Let’s say you’re visiting a company, and that visit needs to remain a secret. Would you remember to disable the Plazer application before you go online at that location? (Check one)
(A) Yes, absolutely (40%)
(B) Most likely (30%)
(C) No (30%)Did you consider how your location information could be of benefit to those with malicious intent? E.g. burglars who’ll know when you’re not at home? (Check one)
(*) Yes (78%)
(*) No (22%)Are you concerned about goverment / police access to and use of your location information? (Check one)
(*) Yes (57%)
(*) No (43%)Plazes has placed its servers in Switzerland because of stricter privacy laws. Do you care? (Check one)
(*) Yes (69%)
(*) No (31%)Have you been able to use Plazes to hook up with people? (Check one)
(A) No, not at all. (26%)
(B) Yes, but rarely. (69%)
(C) Yes, all the time. (4%)Have you ever been approached through Plazes by someone whose intentions you’d consider questionable? (Check one)
(A) Yes (9%)
(B) No, why would this happen? (22%)
(C) No, but I’m aware this could happen (69%)Would this (question 12) affect your future use of Plazes? (Check one)
(A) Yes (13%)
(B) No (48%)
(C) Not sure (39%)When you balance privacy issues with the benefits of using Plazes, do you think it’s a good trade-off? (Check one)
(*) Yes (79%)
(*) No (21%)Would you mind advertising targeted at you because of your current location and/or frequent hangouts? (Check one)
(A) No, as long as it’s relevant (56%)
(B) No, I don’t care if it’s relevant either (0%)
(C) Yes, my location information belongs to me and should not be used for marketing (35%)
(D) Yes, I dislike all advertising (9%)If you’d decide to stop using Plazes, would you remove your location history? (Check one)
(*) Yes (52%)
(*) No (48%)
Looking back at those results it was rather interesting. :)
Ricardo | 24 April 2007, 08:40 | link
Thanks for the survey, it’s very helpful!
stefan | 24 April 2007, 10:18 | link
Cool survey, never knew people where out there reaserching this stuff
Denise | 25 April 2007, 05:03 | link
I think 23 is not a sufficient number of users for drawing a conclusions… But I agree with Ricardo, it was interesting to see the results :-)
Kraig | 31 May 2007, 04:14 | link
It`s interesting to read about privacy concerns (No 10). Here in Germany we have the discussion about less privacy rights. The “Fight against Terror” is used to restrict our rights. So I believe places in the world where privacy rights will be accepted, will be the last privacy islands in the world.
Ralf | 12 June 2007, 07:43 | link