GraffitiGeo‘s catchphrase is “Tag your city”. It’s not “Review local nightspots”, “Rate local restaurants” or “What’s the local buzz?”. Rather it’s a good, open-ended capability statement that leaves the service open to myriad interpretations. As long as you have an iPhone 3G or 3GS, that is.

The idea is that you create walls, leave comments and have conversations on walls while you’re out and about.  You can keep track of where you’ve been, what you saw/did there and what you thought of it at the time.  Business reviews, spotted street art, hidden gems not yet in the guidebooks (though it won’t take long before the travel sites are exploiting and citing such systems), gig reports, accommodation complaints, whatever.  As Gibson noted “… the street finds its own uses for things”.  They’re sharing data with SocialGreat.com too; that system aggregates data from GraffitiGeo, Brightkite and FourSquare to take the pulse of a city and mashes the tags and check-ins with Google Maps and Yelp reviews.

There are social and game elements to the system for those interested in playing.  There are badges to be earned by creating and tagging walls.  You can join groups called mobs and “take over your city” (crews would have been a better choice in keeping with graffiti slang).  The exclusive thing about mobs is that you can only join if you’re invited. You can’t search for mobs, nor can you ask for an invitation.  It’s really about who you know.  You can start your own mob, but only once you’ve earned 100 street cred points. It’s good to have goals.

In comparison with similar apps / services, it has advantages and disadvantages. On the upside, you can create a wall anywhere. In Brightkite you’re limited to places it can find by querying directories or use the vague “near…” reference. Not so with GraffitiGeo. You can’t upload photos or videos, so if that’s important to you, keep Brightkite around.  Same same if you don’t have an iPhone equipped with GPS.  I’ve asked GraffitiGeo if they plan to have apps for other devices and will update this post if/when they get back to me.

It’s not immediately a first-screen app for me, but I’ll be keeping GraffitiGeo on my iPhone to keep Brightkite company for a while. I’m interested in seeing how these augmented reality apps get picked up, or don’t.

It’s currently available for free from Apple’s App Store.

GraffitiGeo's Heatmap of Sydney on 27 Sep 09

GraffitiGeo's Heatmap of Canberra on 27 Sep 09 - Looks like I've got some work to do. CTUB mob coming soon.

GraffitiGeo's map view displays tagged walls

Tapping on a pin reveals basic information

Tapping on the focus icon displays tags that can be voted up or down

(2 votes, average: 4.50 out of 5)

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