Well, it looks like the hammer has finally fallen on Gowalla, as the site is shut down as of this morning. Users who try to go to Gowalla’s website this morning are greeted with a message saying that users could check back later for information on how to download their information from Gowalla.

According to the original announcement, the Gowalla team would be set to work on Facebook’s new Timeline feature, which has been rolling out in recent months and will soon be mandatory for all users. It is also likely that some of Gowalla’s features will be integrated into Facebook’s own check-in feature, as well.

Though not unexpected, Gowalla’s closure is a disappointment to the service’s remaining fans, some of whom took to Twitter to express their sentiments.

Are you sad to see Gowalla go? Gowalla users, will you switch to Foursquare, or use Facebook Check-ins? Or will you switch to something else completely? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Here’s an excerpt from the announcement:

We created Gowalla to inspire people to go out and share those places, photos and stories. The past three years have been quite the journey, oft-times in a very literal sense!

We know how much many of you loved Gowalla. It’s been the highlight of our lives as we’ve built it with your help over the past two years. As we move forward, we hope some of the inspiration behind Gowalla — a fun and beautiful way to share your journey on the go — will live on at Facebook.

Williams reiterated in a tweet:

There was initially some concern about Facebook getting user data, so we provided a how-to for deleting your Gowalla profile, but it appears this won’t be much of an issue.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Facebook getting Gowalla could mean one of two things. One less competitor for Foursquare, or a much stronger competitor to Foursquare from Facebook.

Citing “a source close to Gowalla”, CNN Money learned that the company had been purchased Facebook for an undisclosed sum.

With that in mind, if you don’t want Facebook to have to opportunity of getting your personal data… you might want to delete your Gowalla account. Here’s how to do it:

Log into your Gowalla account. In the top right corner you’ll see your avatar, accompanied by the word “You“. Click on the down arrow, and then on “Settings“.

Once the “Settings” screen has loaded you’ll find the “Delete Account” link in the lower left corner.

Upon clicking the link, you’ll be taken to a screen asking you to enter your password twice, you can then click the “Delete Account” button.

You’re done. If you won’t want Facebook gaining access to your Gowalla check-in information, you might want to delete your account, just a friendly heads up.

Are you planning on deleting your Gowalla account? Tell us in the comment section below.

Citing “a source close to Gowalla”, CNN Money says Facebook has purchased the company for an undislosed amount.

The Gowalla team, including founder Josh Williams, will move from their Austin, Texas headquarters to Facebook’s in Palo Alto, California. It’s rumored the team will be working on Facebook’s timeline feature, which is still being rolled out to Facebook members.

“It’s a perfect match,” said the unnamed source to CNN Money. “As far as the big picture, Gowalla’s vision is about people telling stories, and Facebook’s vision for Timeline is about stories about important moments in life.”

It’s not clear at this time if the Gowalla service will remain active. Facebook is kind of known for acquiring startups just for the engineers and developers behind them. (Beluga, anyone?)

If you’re looking to delete your Gowalla account, here is a step-by-step guide on how to do it.

What do you think of this news? Tell us in the comment area below.

Gowalla, which began as a check-in app, now views check-ins as “transactional”. The company says it wanted to do something faster, more connected and memorable. MG Siegler, who describes the new Gowalla as being all about travel and storytelling, explains:

When you load up Gowalla, the first thing you see is still a main activity feed. Here you’ll find the activity from your friends. Because Gowalla isn’t completely pivoting away from their core location functionality, much of the data and social connections remain intact. But instead of a stream of check-ins, you’ll notice people hanging out together. They’re checking-in, but they’re also taking pictures and talking to one another in clusters that are known as “Stories”.

There is also a Guides feature, which provides travel guides (25 at launch) from various partners, including: Disney Parks, National Geographic, Stanford, University of Texas, University of Florida, and University of Oklahoma.

In May, Beyond put out an infographic showing how social location app are used. They found that 90% of users check in on Facebook, while 22% check in on Foursquare and just 6% on Gowalla. That’s a good reason for Gowalla to focus less on the check-in element, although even Foursquare would gladly admit that there is much more to be done around the check-in. The check-in itself is not the endgame.

The statistics were derived from the 16.7 million mobile users than use location-based services and check-in with Facebook Places, Foursquare and Gowalla among others.  That’s 7.1% of the entire mobile population.  Out of those 16.7 million that check-in, 12.7 million of them did it on a smartphone.

The check-in population is split pretty evenly when it comes to sex, with females edging out males by 1.6%.  As far as age, young people are the ones who are doing the bulk of the check-ins.  Users aged 18-24 accounted for 26% of the check-in users and those aged 25-34 accounted for 32.5% of the check-in population.

The majority of check-in service users are employed full-time (46.6%) or a full-time student (23.3%).  Also, check-ins are most frequently taking place on Android and iOS phones.  36.6% of check-in service users do so on Android and 33.7% do so on an iPhone.  When the amount of the total smartphone population each OS represents is taken into account, however, Apple has the higher check-in participation per user.

Not surprisingly, check-in service users are also more likely to access other forms of mobile media.  Nearly 62% of the that specific population accesses news – 40.3% tech news.  Also, 28.2% of check-in service users reported owning a tablet, which is higher than the percentage for all smartphone users (19.6).  Moral of the story: people who check-in are more likely to keep up with new tech.

“Although still in their relative infancy, location-based mobile check-in services are seeing rather impressive adoption among smartphone users,” said Mark Donovan, comScore senior vice president of mobile. “The ability to interact with consumers on this micro-local level through special offers, deals and other incentives provides brands with the real-time opportunity to engage consumers through their mobile device.”

In other check-in news, Beyond recently put out this infographic that shows how social location apps are used by those who have adopted them, why non-users would consider trying them and what people are talking about on the web in terms of location apps.

They found that 90% of users check-in via Facebook places, 22% via Foursquare and 6% via Gowalla.  Of those who do not use location apps, 55% said they would consider using Facebook Places and only 6% would consider using Foursquare.

Gowalla CEO Josh Williams spilled the news onstage today at the GeeknRolla conference in London.  Martin Bryant reported, “Williams discussed how, with user numbers now in excess of one million, 45% of the company’s growth is outside US – particularly Europe and the Middle East.  Looking to support and fuel this, ‘four or five’ members of staff would be based here.”

That’s an interesting move.  As we suggested after Foursquare announced it might open an office in the UK, it shows that Gowalla’s been successful enough in its home market to branch out and has some spare cash.

It of course also shows that Gowalla is willing to go head-to-head with both Foursquare and Facebook Places.  (Consider that Facebook’s quite dominant in the UK, even beating Google in terms of visits on Christmas Day.)

Anyway, Bryant continued, “Williams discussed the company’s plans to move beyond check-ins and ‘gamification’ to become a social travel guide that works like ‘Lonely Planet written by your friends.’  Looking to provide the best user experience for ‘Sharing the world around you,’ Williams explained how the company has turned down offers from potential business partners, preferring to concentrate on travel-related businesses with ‘great locations.’”

One last note: there’s no word yet on when Gowalla’s new office will open or where exactly it might be located.

Starting today, visitors to the parks can engage with others through custom Disney Gowalla pages and Passport Stamps.

Hundreds of locations within Disneyland and Walt Disney World Resorts will feature custom Stamps created by Gowalla – the largest number of custom Gowalla Passport Stamps ever developed for a brand.  The Stamps can be collected in their Gowalla Passports and kept as a virtual scrapbook by park-goers.  In addition, park visitors will discover and collect Pins as a special reward for visiting featured Spots, and Virtual Items will be placed around the parks.

"Gowalla is the perfect complement to the park visit by rewarding guests with exclusive digital stamps, and by suggesting new ways to explore the parks with fun trip itineraries," said Leslie Ferraro, executive vice president, Global Marketing for Disney Destinations.  

"We are excited to work with Gowalla to enhance the check-in experience for our guests.”

To participate, guests are encouraged to join Gowalla via the web or download the free application onto their smartphone.  All the custom Stamps and Items guests collect will be added to their Gowalla Passport and each check-in can be shared via Facebook and Twitter.
 

At ad:tech NY, location-based services have been a hot topic of discussion (possibly the hottest). Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley spoke about his ambitions for making Foursquare an incredible tool for local businesses. A bit later, Greg Sterling led a panel with Murphy USA Internet Business Director Casey Petersen, Whrrl VP of products John Kim, MTV.com and VH1.com General Manager Kristin Frank, and Gowalla Director of Business Development Andy Ellwood. 

Petersen and Kim discussed how Murphy USA (the Gas stations in front of Walmart) has been utilizing check-in app Whrrl to engage customers, build loyalty, and increase recommendations. Interestingly 44% of check-ins were new customers. More interesting yet, 85% of check-ins came because of the program, in cases when it would’ve been more convenient to go to a competitor.

According to Petersen, those using the app are three times more likely to visit more than once per week vs average customers, about 50% visit over six times a month, 72% are more likely to recommend a friend, and 56% are more likely to increase purchases due to the program.

In terms of influence, Petersen said Whrrl came in just behind email and Facebook, and over SMS and Twitter for Murphy USA’s customers. The three lessons Murphy USA and Whrrl learned from the project, as presented by Kim, were:

1. Align goals of the business and LBS service
2. Building proof should be first goal. Scale second. 
3. Use LBS to highlight real people at your physical business in your broader social media efforts. 

Frank said of MTV, "We’re always trying to set the standards and lead the way in social media. MTV and VH1 were the first media companies to partner with Foursquare on celebrity mode, she said, and MTV has the most followers on Foursquare of any brand. 

"We’ve recently moved to more of an ‘expand the brand’ model," she said.

"Our audience expects us to embrace these different sites…different technologies that they’re using," she added.

"At the end of the day, Facebook is already starting to go there [LBS]…when they open it up to application development….that’s when this thing goes mainstream."

Let’s not forget Gowalla. Ellwood said, "It’s not just the check-ins. It’s also the photos that you take and the comments that you make." 

"Gowalla is a virtual passport for your phone that allows you to catalog places visited, photos taken, comments shared and pins collected."

A question he says businesses should be asking is, "What are the places that my brand should be associated with?" 

The places, by the way, don’t have to be predictable.

More WebProNews Videos

Businesses are still struggling with finding the right social media strategies, let alone strategies for check-in apps like Foursquare, Gowalla, and the recently launched Facebook Places. WebProNews spoke with Lawrence Coburn, CEO of geolocation app provider DoubleDutch about where this industry is headed and what it means for businesses looking to take advantage. 

"I think it’s still early days," he tells us. "I think a huge step for the whole industry was when Facebook Places launched a check-in. And I think the big question that we all need to answer is like ‘is the check-in becoming a gesture that’s gonna be as common as a status update?’ which is, you know, Twitter’s thing…I think it is. I think we’ve passed critical mass, especially with Facebook in the game."

"What Facebook did is they launched a very basic service, and with a couple exceptions," he adds. "They did some pretty cool stuff, but for the most part, it’s very basic."

Facebook has over half a billion users, so naturally, when the company launched Facebook Places, a lot questions surfaced about other check-in services. Would they be able to compete with such a monster? 

"It looks to me like Foursquare has weathered the storm with Facebook’s initial launch, and I don’t think Foursquare’s going anywhere," Coburn says. "I think they’re gonna keep growing. I do think that there’s gonna be a shake-out, like right now there’s probably 10 or 15 consumer-facing check-in apps, and I don’t know if the market can support all those identical apps, but I think we’ll see some fragmentation as well."

"I think the real competition from the Facebook ecoystem is gonna come from third-party developers like Zynga that build on top of the Facebook Places API, because you’ll notice with Facebook Places that they haven’t done anything with like virtual goods like badges or points, and these are some of the main attractions of Foursquare and Gowalla," he adds. "So they’ve just left that open, but I know that third-party developers won’t be so shy, and they’ll come in and make games, because there’s a lot of good game developers on Facebook."

Games are one thing, and there are ways businesses can take advantage of games themselves, but is there more to this phenomenon than just games? Real business applications? 

"I think that location is so fundamental that it has its chance to be its own mega-hit in it’s own right," Coburn says. "Think about it. You want to know where your friends are. You want to know where your family is. You need to know where your co-workers are….To me it’s almost more fundamental than like a status update, which if you had to pitch Twitter to me on paper now, if I had never seen it, it would be a tough sell, but it worked. It became like a communication channel in its own right."

"Right now you hear about a lot of campaigns that big brands are doing with Foursquare, in terms of giving away free stuff, I think Gowalla gave away a bunch of New Jersey Nets tickets. Then there’s like deals with Starbucks and I think, Brightkite," he says. "It’s all interesting stuff, but I think there’s a lot of experimentation, trying to see where the value is for big brands…We do know this: if a consumer tells you (a brand, a company) where they are, it’s a big deal." 

"It’s almost like a search query that isn’t going to Google," he continues. "It’s like they’re telling you ‘I’m here, what do you have for me?’ and that’s an opportunity for brands and marketers, and I think we’re gonna figure it out as to where the monetary value is."

Have you found interesting ways to use check-in apps for your business? Comment here.