Gowalla is a solid check-in location app in its own right, but it definitely needs to pull some clever moves to get out from under Foursquare‘s shadow. AMEX partnerships? Not worth it. Photo sharing integrations? Kindergarten stuff.
Gowalla has just become a citizen-supported, news community for CNN. Starting today, CNN iReport will turn Gowalla users into citizen news crawlers using its brand new iReport Highlight feature.
Here’s how it works: When you check-in on Gowalla, add the iReport Highlight and your story will be uploaded to the CNN iReport. News stories will be vetted by the CNN newsroom and used for the network’s reporting. If your story is amazing, you will receive an iReport Pin from CNN for your Gowalla Passport. Gowalla users can also share their CNN iReport highlights on Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. I haven’t seen the iReport feature added to the app yet, but I expect it will be there soon.
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Gowalla users will expand the network of CNN iReport’s 740,000 iReporters. “Opening up iReport to the Gowalla community is an exciting step for participatory journalism,” said Lila King, participation director for CNN.com. “By bringing the power of location services to our iReport community, we are connecting our audience to the precise places where news events are happening.”
Gowalla also recently upgraded its Android app, check out our hands-on feature here.
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