At long last, Twitter is allowing for (at least a little) location-aware

capabilities.

“Developers will be able to access this new geolocation feature early which means it will most likely be available on your app of choice before it is available on Twitter’s Web site. Later, we will add it to our mobile Web site and Twitter.com as well,” wrote Twitter co-founder Biz Stone.

As eBrand reports, it comes in the form of

“An API that will allow users for accurate, tweet-level location data and make the information accessible both on the main Twitter site and through external applications. Tweets will include location based metadata attached to them including latitude and longitude details.”

While many are talking about what this will mean for marketing, I’m more interested in what it may mean for digital activism and such efforts as CrisisWire, Ushahidi and crisis mapping.

To start, the feature is optional, and a user can opt-in to use it.

More on this later, but I can’t wait to hear what Patrick will have to say about the technological capabilities of this and how it be used with mapping platforms.

Related articles by Zemanta

• TWITTER LOCAL: Twitter to Attach Locations to Your Tweets (mashable.com)
• Geolocation coming to Twitter and its external applications (macworld.com)
• Twitter API getting location data (news.cnet.com)