On May 25th I’ll be speaking at the Go Beyond Pixels Conference for designers and developers, right here in my beautiful city — St. John’s, Newfoundland.

I’m thrilled to be able to share my thoughts alongside industry leaders Jeffrey Zeldman, Aarron Walter, Ethan Marcotte, Jeremy Keith, and Josh Clark. I’ll be doing a short and practical talk called Colouring the Web. A huge thanks goes out to organizer Levin Mejia for giving me the opportunity!

Go Beyond Pixels will be an event not to be missed. I hope to see our creative community come together for an educational and inspiring day — followed up by a rockin’ afterparty at Club One downtown (there’ll be door prizes, too!). Get your tickets now, and don’t forget to sign up for the Microsoft-sponsored Hackathon which will take place the evening before.

See you there!

Admittedly, I’m a bit of a pack rat. I’m not talking hoarders-style, but I do have trouble parting with little things that are memorable for me. Not just the special toys, books, and photos — I’m that person who keeps every movie ticket stub, boarding pass, and concert ticket neatly in a scrapbook to reflect on every now and then.

My tendency to hold on to memories has naturally crossed over into the digital world. I keep all e-mail conversations, I rarely delete tweets, and I have extensive archives of photography and artwork. Even MP3s of songs I’ve grown sick of are more likely to end up backed up on a CD than thrown in the Trash.

The physical scrapbook of travel memories sits on my bookshelf and belongs to me — it’s in my control. But what happens when we entrust our memories to a service on the Internet?

It seems we’re reminded about how volatile digital data is all too often. A few days ago, one of my favourite social networks, Gowalla, was permanently shut down after being acquired by Facebook in late 2011.

If you aren’t familiar, Gowalla was a popular location-based iPhone app that would allow users to “check in” to any type of place, whether it was a shop, office, landmark, airport, or anything else you could think of. Once checked in, the user would receive a “stamp” — comparable to a digital passport. And, if it was your first time checking into a new state, province, or country, you’d receive a stamp for those, too.

Gowalla, and other check-in apps, aren’t everyone’s cup of tea. People have often wondered why I would ever use it, but it all boiled down to one thing — it kept a detailed history of my travels. They were my memories.

While Gowalla is no more, the people behind it understand that we want to keep those memories and they’re working on making a tool that will allow us to export our data. I’ve since switched to Foursquare as my primary check-in app. But how do we know where Foursquare will go? Will they also be acquired by the great Facebook vacuum, or will popularity fade? Of course, the benefit outweighs the risk and these things don’t stop me from using new services, but they do make me think about how I use them and how to preserve my data if they too disappear someday.

At the web conference An Event Apart in Boston last year, web developer and author Jeremy Keith discussed the topic of long-term design challenges in his talk titled All Our Yesterdays. Here’s an encore of his talk from Build Conference in Belfast in December 2011. It’s long, but worth it — Jeremy touches on some incredibly important topics including web hosting, file formats and media, domain names, and DRM licensing issues and restrictions.

Jeremy Keith - All Our Yesterdays from Build on Vimeo.

Jeremy also talks about one of the largest and saddest shutdowns of an Internet service: when Yahoo! closed Geocities in 2009, losing at least 38 million user-built pages.

A quote Jeremy referenced, from designer Phil Gyford, says it best:

“GeoCities is an awful, ugly, decrepit mess. And this is why it will be sorely missed. It’s not only a fine example of the amateur web vernacular but much of it is an increasingly rare example of a period web vernacular. GeoCities sites show what normal, non-designer, people will create if given the tools available around the turn of the millennium.”

Just last week, through a combination of some clever googling and the website Archive.org, I was lucky enough to find the remnants of one of the first websites I made and hosted on Geocities. It’s ugly and embarrassing, but what it contributes to the story of my design career is priceless.

Can we really continue to depend on third party services to entrust our data? As Jeremy said so well in his talk — nobody’s too big to fail on the web.

Publishing on the Internet is not just about blog posts, news articles, and Wikipedia entries. It’s about what everyday people do in their everyday lives. How we go about solving this problem is daunting — but acknowledging that it is a problem is a good start. If we don’t change our mindset about how we treat our data, we could look back on this time with very little of our digital history preserved.

Every year 400 women in Newfoundland and Labrador are diagnosed with breast cancer. On March 31st, I’ll be joining my co-workers and Busting a Move for Breast Health! Our team, Simply The Breast, has pledged to raise $8000 (CAD) for the cause.

What is it?

Bust a Move is a six-hour fitness fundraiser held by the Health Care and Dr. H. Bliss Murphy Cancer Care Foundations that will empower, motivate and unite — bringing hundreds together in support of the same goal — breast health. One of the fitness sessions will be led by the one and only Richard Simmons, so it’s sure to be a time!

Where Will The Proceeds Go?

Proceeds from Bust a Move will be used to advance the developments in the areas of diagnostic imaging, surgery, cancer care and community health. More details about the equipment and programs that will be purchased with the proceeds can be found on the Bust a Move NL website.

My Goal

I need to raise $1000 (CAD), which is certainly no small task, in order to participate in the event. Together, my team has to raise $8000, so anything above and beyond my $1000 goal will be used to help my teammates reach theirs.

How to Donate

If you have a credit card, you can sponsor me on the Bust a Move NL website. I’m also accepting donations via PayPal, although I won’t be able to provide a receipt through this method. If you know me in person, you can donate cash or cheque, so please ask me for details!

Sponsor Me on the Bust a Move NL Website (Recommended)  or via PayPal…

Guaranteed there’ll be plenty of photos and video which I’ll post after the event. Please help me reach my goal!

Highlights

Early in the year, I worked with Anthony Calzadilla and Andy Clarke on Madmanimation — a CSS3 animation for Andy’s talk which was featured in all six An Event Apart dates across the US. I worked on the design with Anthony, who animated the scenes, while Andy progressively enhanced and provided fallbacks for less capable browsers. The great thing about watching this talk evolve throughout the year has been browser support — in April there was only support for Webkit-based browsers, but by December, both Firefox and Internet Explorer 10 added support. You can watch the full demo on the Madmanimation site.

In May, I finally launched this website, hellogeri.com. I’m still quite pleased with the result, although my next version will definitely be responsive. You can read about my experience designing the site in an older blog post.

This year was another great year for travel — I was lucky enough to visit both Seattle and Boston for An Event Apart, and England for a trip with my parents. There, I got to spend time in London, visit one of my best friends in Sheffield, attend Update Conference (and dine in a royal palace) in Brighton, and see Beachy Head — the beautiful white cliffs in the South Downs that I’ve wanted to visit for years! While the conferences were great learning experiences, nothing beats the friendships I’ve made with so many inspirational and talented people all around the world.

Things I Learned

It’s safe to say that I learned more about the web in 2011 than I have in any other year to date. While I learned quite a bit in 2010, too, 2011 was the year that I put most of this knowledge into practice with results I feel proud of. Coming from a formal background in print design with only a casual dabbling in web has made for a definite challenge, but one where I’m happy to say I’ve made much progress. I made my first responsive website in 2011, and also learned the basics of the ExpressionEngine CMS thanks to some mentoring and a few great tutorials.

In addition to my web study, I managed to squeeze in more illustration this year than any other year to date. My retro caricatures have definitely been a hit and I’ll be continuing to do them in the new year.

Most importantly, I learned a lot of important life lessons. I’m happy to say that I’m ending the year on a high note — stronger, more confident, more optimistic.

Goals for 2012

As for travel, I’m already making plans to return to England with a quick trip up to Scotland in the new year. I want to find more time for photography — one area where I feel like I didn’t improve in 2011. I want to teach more web design, especially to younger students, and contribute more to the community. In early 2012 I’ll be launching a website to help bring the local web community closer together through meetups and other events.

I’ve also started a new blog with my lovely and talented friend Dave Hynes. We love pushing each other to improve, and although he’s mainly interested in film and VFX and I’m more into web, we both share a love for sci-fi, fantasy, comic art and illustration. Keep checking Pure Mad Like for updates on our collaborations!

And finally, I have my first consultation next week with a Japanese teacher for private lessons, something I’ve wanted to do for years. It’ll be an interesting change of pace, especially with learning how to balance between study and freelance.

Happy New Year, and hope to see many of you in 2012!

A few years ago I filled out a book of watercolour paper with whatever colours and textures I could think of, and scanned them for personal use. Hopefully other people will find them useful as well!

Download: 12 High Resolution Watercolour Textures (29MB)

Watercolour Textures by Geri Coady is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

They fall under a Creative Commons 3,0 Unported license, meaning you are free to share and remix for both personal and commercial use, but I would love to know if you decide to use them and please share the results!

For Web Designers & Developers

A Book Apart Holiday Bundle

These books are a pure joy to read and belong on the shelf of any web designer. In fact, they probably already are on the shelf of the designer you’ve got in mind, so try to find out beforehand if these are needed in their collection. You can purchase them separately or save big on a set of six with their current holiday promotion.

• A Book Apart Holiday Bundle

Pixelworker Tees

These shirts are the unofficial uniforms of the unspoken alliance of web workers. Better hurry, although these shirts won’t be shipping in time for Christmas, once they’ve been sold out, they’ll be retired and won’t be printed again.

• Pixelworkers T-Shirts

The Manual

A beautifully crafted archive of insights on the maturing of design on the web. No tutorials or code here — the Manual is full of reflections, lessons, and inspiration, and will push you to change how you think about your work. It’s available in single issues, or save on a three-issue subscription. Did I mention how beautiful this book is? A must-have.

• The Manual

Typekit Subscription

Typekit is a subscription-based library of web fonts built with web standards in mind. It’s an invaluable tool for every web designer. Although there’s no option to gift an account, why not offer to foot the bill for a year’s subscription? There are different pricing models available, so your designer can pick what’s best for their needs.

• Typekit Subscription

Web Conference Ticket

If you’re in the mood to splurge, this is the best gift money can buy for any web designer or developer. Although many conferences closer to Christmas (like New Adventures) have long been sold out, check out some of the upcoming dates in 2012. The world-class An Event Apart has seven dates, including Atlanta, Seattle, Boston, Austin, Washington DC, Chicago, and San Francisco. There’s also the new Interlink workshops that will be hosted on various dates in Vancouver. And although no tickets are on sale yet, you can always give an IOU for conference tickets to Build or dConstruct, in the UK. As for getting there —  gift cards for your preferred airline would never go astray!

• An Event Apart
• Interlink Workshops
• Build 2012
• dConstruct

For Print Designers

Pantone Cufflinks

Designers probably aren’t the first people that come to mind when you think of suits and ties, but for the rare occasion that dressy attire is needed, why not accessorise with some Pantone cufflinks? Available in 18 different colours.

• Pantone Cufflinks

Pantone Chips Journal

Keeping with the Pantone theme, check out this brand new Pantone chips journal available through the MoMA Design Store.

• Pantone Chips Journal

Box Bottle Bag

A lovely little hardcover book from Andrew Hibbs, curator of The Dieline, it includes over 140 examples of the world’s most beautiful and inspiring packaging design. Available from Amazon.

• Box Bottle Bag by Andrew Hibbs

Type Coasters

Although they may be a little impractical at catching drips, these coasters, made from laser-etched mature bamboo, will never look out of place underneath your favourite designer’s coffee mug.

• Type Coasters

Lost Type Co-op Fonts

Let’s face it, designers love typography and more fonts are always welcomed! This co-op of type designers, founded by offers fonts that are priced with a pay-what-you want model. Each type designer gets 100% of the donations paid. It’s Christmas, so be generous when purchasing them, okay?

• Lost Type Co-op Fonts

For Illustrators

Wacom Intuos 4 Tablet

If you’re looking for a gift for a digital illustrator, it’s likely that they already have a Wacom tablet. If not, and you’re in the mood to splurge, you can’t go wrong with the Intuos 4. It’s a big step above the casual Bamboo tablet, but not as luxurious (or expensive) as the Cintiq touchscreens. There’s also an Intuous carrying case if your illustrator is on the go often.

• Wacom Intuos 4 Tablet
• Wacom Intuos 4 Carrying Case

Wacom Bamboo iPad Stylus + Sketchbook Pro

Sketchbook Pro is hands down the best drawing and painting app I’ve used on the iPad. Combine this app with a stylus like the Wacom Bamboo, and suddenly the iPad is converted into a surprisingly capable digital canvas. Also, check out the NomadBrush for a creative tool that simulates real painting (as long as you aren’t doing anything too detailed!)

• Sketchbook Pro App on iTunes
• Wacom Bamboo Stylus
• NomadBrush

Copic Markers

Copic Markers are some of the highest quality markers available and are widely used in Japanese manga especially. They’re available in hundreds of colours, various widths and sizes, and feature replaceable nibs and refillable ink.

• Copic Markers

ImagineFX Magazine Subscription

ImagineFX is one of the best magazines I’ve seen for digital illustrators. It’s heavily focused on fantasy and science fiction themed artwork, and it’s packed with tutorials, interviews, inspiring portfolios and much more. Available as a print or digital subscription.

• ImagineFX Magazine Subscription

Palomino Blackwing Pencils & Sketchbooks

These pencils are as close to luxury as pencils might ever get. The Palomino Blackwing was launched as a modern version of the iconic Eberhard-Faber Blackwing pencil that was favoured by artists such as Stephen Sondheim and Frank Lloyd Wright. Check out the sketch kit bundle, or the more affordable 12 pack gift set. Also available are beautiful artist series sketchbooks.

• Palomino Blackwing 12-pack Gift Set
• Palomino Blackwing Luxury Sketch Kit Bundle
• Palomino Blackwing Artist Series Sketchbook

For Photographers

Lomography Keychains

These adorable little keychains will look perfect on any camera bag or purse. Full set of eight! Each comes in a reusable tin film canister.

• Lomography Keychains

Polaroid Camera Print

This would look great in any photographer’s home! Choose your own colour background. Each print is signed by the artist.

• Polaroid Camera Print

Kelly Moore Photography Bags

Wait, what? A photo bag that isn’t made from ugly black canvas with velcro and plastic? It’s true — check out these lovely camera bags for the ladies — great for carrying your gear to an event where something a little stylish would look more appropriate. There’s bags for the guys, too.

• Kelly Moore Photography Bags for Women
• Kelly Moore Photography Bags for Men

Lens Cap Strap Holder

Stop wasting time looking for missing lens caps with these clever and cute little holders that slide onto your camera’s neck strap. Available in different sizes for all of your lenses!

• Lens Cap Strap Holder

B&H Photo Gift Card

If you can’t decide what to get the picky photographer on your list, head over to B&H and buy a gift card — this store has absolutely everything a photographer would ever need or want. If you’re in Manhattan, be sure to drop by the superstore and snack on the free kosher candy and pretzels while you shop!

• B&H Photo Gift Card

For General Geeks

Star Wars Moleskines

It seems like the Star Wars series goes hand in hand with designers and other creative people. These limited-edition Moleskines are available in two sizes (notebook and sketchbook) with ruled pages or plain pages. Available from The Paperie.

• Star Wars Moleskines

Freelance Ain’t Free Tee

Freelance Ain’t Free, and neither is this shirt, so support the folks who came up with this great design and buy it for the freelancer on your list.

• Freelance Ain’t Free Tee

Pack & Smooch Accessories

I’ve had my Pack & Smooch iPad sleeve for a few months now, and I absolutely love it. The merino wool is durable and not at all like cheap felt. Next on my want list is a matching sleeve for my iPod! If you’re looking for something similar but slightly more masculine in design, there’s also the hard graft brand, which is comparable in price and equal in quality.

• Pack & Smooch Accessories
• hard graft Accessories

Roll-Up Travel Charger

This little charger not only looks great, but charges up to four devices simultaneously. The connectors are compatible with iPods, iPhones and iPads, as well as Mini USB, Micro USB, and Samsung devices.

• Roll-Up Travel Charger

Natural USB Memory Sticks

A clever take on the term “memory stick”, these little guys are made from hand-selected wood, so no two are alike. Available in 1GB, 2GB, 4GB and 8GB capacities.

• Natural USB Memory Sticks

What’s on your wishlist this holiday season?

Today on Facebook, I saw a status update from a person who was complaining about his current workterm placement after attending a college technology program for three years. He asked, “So when do I get the job I signed up for?”

While statements like these rub me the wrong way on a good day, I was completely dumbfounded at how anyone could say it today, of all days. A day after the passing of Steve Jobs, one of the most hardworking, passionate, and inspirational technology visionaries of our time.

Thank you Steve, for inspiring so many of us to work harder toward our goals and to never settle for less. While his attitude resonates with a lot of us, there are still many people out there who have no spark, no drive, no ambition — yet have a serious sense of self-entitlement just for dishing out tuition to attend school. When will they realise it’s not that simple?

We don’t sign up for jobs. We work for them. Sure, some people get lucky, but those who don’t need to make it for themselves.

To that person, I leave them with this tweet, spotted on my feed earlier today.

Lenses

Nikon AF-S 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5 DX

This is the first lens I owned, which came with my D70s body back in 2007. I don’t use it very often, in fact, I can’t remember the last time it was attached to my camera.

View on Flickr

Nikon AF 50mm f/1.8 D
If anyone has a Nikon and doesn’t own this lens, they probably shouldn’t have a dSLR in the first place. This is, of course, my go-to lens for portraits and food photography.

View on Flickr

View on Flickr

Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 AT-X
This was my first lens purchase from another manufacturer. I opted for the Tokina instead of the Nikkor 12-24 AF-S DX not only because of price, but this quote from Ken Rockwell pretty much sums it up:

“This Tokina 11-16mm is the world’s fastest and sharpest ultrawide lens for small format digital cameras (Nikon DX and Canon 1.6x). Considering its bargain price of under $600, its the world’s best ultrawide lens for digital SLRs.”

Done deal! It’s been a joy to shoot with.

View on Flickr

Nikkor AF 85mm f/1.8D
I can’t review this lens much yet, because I just got it last week and I’ve been too busy to get out and shoot. Watch this space!

Filters

Some of these filters are B+W, and some are cheaper generic brand names I’ve had to pick up in a pinch.

77mm Circular Polarizer
77mm Neutral Density Grad filter
67mm Circular Polarizer
67mm UV filter
62mm -> 77mm step up ring

Lighting and Accessories

Two Nikon SB-600 Speedlites
I mostly use these for bounce flashes, but I occasionally pop them on a couple of lightstands, throw on some umbrellas and use the Nikon CLS to shoot.

View on Flickr

Two lightstands
One shoot through umbrella
One reflective umbrella
Collapsable gold/silver reflector
Remote control
SLIK tripod

Work Studio

While this gear isn’t mine, I did pick it out for the studio and can use it whenever I want. We’re moving soon, so excuse the mess in the photo. I can’t wait to get more gear and have a proper space in the new location!

Canon Rebel XTi
This camera’s been around the office long before I have. It comes with the terrible 18-55mm lens which feels more like a toy than a tool. Nevertheless, I’ve used it for a few studio shots when my personal camera’s been left at home. It gets the job done in a pinch (but just barely if I have to use that lens).

Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 USM
Again, I don’t use the work camera often, but I have taken a few shots with this telephoto lens. A little soft, but a good first telephoto for beginners.

View on Flickr

Three AlienBees B800 lights
I adore these. Straightforward, simple, portable, and powerful. I hope we can pick up a fourth light soon.

View on Flickr

Other studio gear
Shoot through umbrella
Reflective umbrella
Softbox
Three 107” seamless paper backdrops (Black, White, Thunder Gray)

Wishlist

While “everything” is a nice answer, realistically, these are things I’ll probably pick up at some point in the future.

AlienBees ABR800 Ringflash
Nikkor AF Micro 60mm f/2.8D
Nikkor AF 50mm f/1.4D
Nikkor AF-S 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR Zoom

I recently returned from my very first trip to the UK — a family vacation that I planned close to Brighton Digital Festival, a month-long celebration of technology in one of England’s most creative cities. While I was unable to attend dConstruct, I did pick up a ticket to the brand new Update Conference, organized and curated by developer Aral Balkan.

Until then I had only attended An Event Apart so it was quite a different experience — from ticket price and social events, to conference format and entertainment, it was obvious that Aral not only wanted it to be a great learning experience, but a spectacle as well!

I won’t comment on every talk, but here are a few highlights:

Anna Debenham

Anna had what I thought to be the most important talk of the day — the frightening state of technology education in the UK. Generally, it’s the same here in Canada — classes focus on how to use specific software, with very little focus on how to build software. Here, most grade-school (and even college) classes teach web design through WYSIWYG applications without teaching the hows and the whys of HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

Anna encouraged everyone to get involved with teaching students the longterm, valuable skills they need. Taking her advice, I will be teaching my Introduction to HTML and CSS class to grade-school students again on November 26th, 2011 at Mount Pearl Intermediate. If you or your child will be in the area and want to attend, please let me know in advance. If you’re a teacher, I strongly encourage you to attend to see why web standards matters and why it is no longer acceptable for it to be absent from a technology curriculum.

Jeremy Keith

I’ve seen Jeremy speak numerous times, and he’s earned my title of “Person Who Could Read The Entire HTML5 Spec Aloud And Make It Sound Exciting.” (He’s also got many other titles.)

Jeremy spoke about the One Web, reminding us how there isn’t a separate “web” specifically for mobile devices, and how we shouldn’t be treating it as such. He wants developers to push for universal accessibility instead of focussing on native apps that are device-dependant.

I see the reasoning for both. On one hand, I understand the importance of accessibility from any device. On the other hand, I do believe that a user experience can be finely tuned when designing around a device, but again — this user experience only applies to those people who own that particular device, thereby cutting everyone else out of the experience altogether.

What we make as developers and designers influences browser makers and feature implementation. If we focus too much on building apps, it’s quite likely that the browser will be ignored by more and more people. I believe that the content of each project should be assessed on a case-by-case basis and we should ask ourselves — does this really need to be a native app, and why? What’s more important, a better user experience for a few, or fully accessible content for all? Choosing to make an app just for the sake of wanting to have it in the iTunes store is not the answer.

Ronald Wayne

There’s Steve Jobs, and there’s Steve Wozniak. But there’s also Ronald Wayne, the third founder of Apple, who gave up his share in the company for $2300. Aral invited Mr. Wayne as a special guest at Update where they had a relaxed conversation about Atari, Apple, and more. Aral and Team Update presented Mr. Wayne with an iPad 2 — his very first Apple product. While I didn’t get to meet Mr. Wayne during the conference, I was lucky enough to meet him in the lobby of my hotel the following morning.

A Royal Experience

It was great to see old friends and meet many new. Thanks to Aral for putting off a wonderful event (the dinner and tour of the Royal Pavilion was a highlight of my trip) and for planting a seed in my own head, as well. Watch this space.

All photos by Geri Coady. See the full set on Flickr.

What is Gowalla?

Gowalla is a social travel guide available for iPhone, iPad, Blackberry, Android and webOS. You can use it to “check in” to any type of place, whether it’s a restaurant, airport, office building, park — if you can visit, you can check in.

I’ve been a huge fan of the app from the first time I used it, but there are quite a few people who struggle with the concept and don’t understand the benefits. Here’s seven reasons why I think Gowalla is a must-have on your mobile device.

Finding Friends

Gowalla is a lot like Twitter — the more friends you follow, the more useful it becomes. While I try to encourage friends in my city to join Gowalla, it’s not quite as popular here as it could be (most just use Facebook places, which is, let’s admit it, awfully boring). Fortunately, I do have a lot of friends in other cities who are very active Gowalla users, especially those in the conference circuits. Recently during my trip to attend An Event Apart Boston, Gowalla let me know when my friends were arriving at the airport, when they were arriving at the hotel, and which sights they were seeing while I was taking a different route. Travelling can be stressful and it’s time consuming to make personal connections to everyone. A simple Gowalla check-in can give your friends a tip on when they can be expecting you.

(Screenshot by Petra Gregorova)

Maps and Location

Instead of firing up Google Maps when I’m travelling, I use Gowalla as a one-stop-shop for checking in and seeing what’s around me. Want to see which restaurants, landmarks, or shops are nearby? No problem!

Digital Passport

You visited New York City last year, and your friend is going next week. She asks for restaurant recommendations, but you just can’t remember the name of that sandwich shop you loved. No problem — check your Gowalla passport for a list of your check-ins.

Keeping Others in the Loop

While I try not to be that person who floods their Twitter stream with Gowalla check-ins that most people don’t care about, I do push updates to Facebook more frequently when I’m travelling. Some people (family, mainly) are interested in seeing the spots I’m visiting; and for those who aren’t, they can hide the updates in their friend feed.

User Experience

Gowalla is an absolute pleasure to use. It’s quick and easy to check in when you’re on the move, thanks to a well-designed, intuitive interface. The rewards of items, pins and stamps keep users engaged and eager to earn more. There’s a dedicated Street Team with special tools available to update out-of-date, duplicate or misplaced spots. There’s a friendly support team who always seem to be available on Twitter to answer any questions you might have. All of these things contribute to Gowalla’s brand values and a better user experience for all.

I remember reading a tweet a few months ago which said, “In Foursquare, users play against each other. In Gowalla, users play together.” This perfectly describes my own feeling of the Gowalla experience.

Design

Let’s face it, other check-in apps are severely lacking in the style department. Gowalla is not only the most beautiful check-in app, but one of the most beautiful apps available, period. Collecting the beautifully illustrated stamps and pins can quickly turn into a real-life scavenger hunt for the most famous landmarks on your trip.

The Future

Although Gowalla doesn’t have the same extensive deal or coupon system that something like Facebook Places or Foursquare has, it’s exciting to think about what’s around the corner. Currently, users receive random bonus items when checking in, and sometimes those items can be exchanged for a real-life prize. Take a look at this contest that A Book Apart held during the launch of Jeremy Keith’s HTML5 for Web Designers.

I have no doubts that the Gowalla team are working on new and exciting ways to bring even more value to users and businesses alike. While we’re waiting, I encourage you to grab your phone, download the app, and go out with Gowalla!

Note: I keep my Gowalla account private as it is full of personal information that sometimes I’m not comfortable sharing with the world. But, if you know me, feel free to send a follow request!  If not, follow me on Twitter and don’t be afraid to say hi!