Is Location Sharing the New Normal?

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 15 June 2023

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Friends tracking friends. Parents tracking kids. Spouses tracking each other. Location sharing has become all the rage in our over-connected world. The feature can be especially handy during an emergency, and can foster a sense of safety, community, and connection. But location sharing can also be misused, leading to privacy concerns and risks such as stalking or harassment. And teens report a “fear of missing out” feeling when they see friends gathering without them. Should we know where our friends and family are at all times? Is this helpful? Healthy? We’ll talk about the pros and cons of sharing coordinates and hear from you: do you love it? Or does it make you uncomfortable? Guests: Rebecca Jennings, senior correspondent covering social platforms and creator economy, Vox - Jennings wrote the recent piece is "Should We Know Where Our Friends Are at All Times?" Julie Jargon, family and tech columnist, Wall Street Journal - Her recent pieces include "Is It OK to Track Your Spouse's Location?" and "Why Teens Say Location Sharing Is the Greatest -- and the Worst." Mahi Jariwala, junior, Monte Vista High School; member, KQED's Youth Advisory Board Joshua Bote, assistant news editor, SFGATE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for Kikiwee Podcasts comes from Rancho La Puerta, a resort with 85 years of wellness experience.
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0:17.5	The Xfinity Wi-Fi is booming!
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0:30.6	From KQED.
0:33.6	... From KQED. From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Rachel Myro and for Mina Kim.
0:53.3	Coming up on forum, have you noticed how location sharing has become totally normalized?
1:00.2	The feature is faster than a text when you're trying to meet up someplace crowded.
1:05.1	Location sharing can even be life-saving on occasion.
1:08.1	But other than your parents or your partner, who do you really want to
1:12.7	know where you are all the time for the rest of time? And if your friends are parting without you,
1:18.9	do you really want to know? When does looking at a friend's bubble constitute stalking or
1:24.9	a mental health risk? It's so hashtag complicated. All of that's next after
1:30.2	this news. This is Forum. I'm Rachel Myro and from Mina Kim. Believe it or not, location sharing
1:42.5	as a thing has been around for more than a decade. Apple released Find My Friends in 2011, then in 2015, Find My Friends came automatically installed on iPhones. In 2017, Google rolled out location sharing on its maps function, and Snapchat launched SnapMap.
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