Social Overdose: On checking in and (possibly) checking out

So I jumped on the wagon and joined Foursquare (not to be confused with the highly popular kids game) about 3 1/2 months ago at the suggestion of a Twitter acquaintance (not quite a friend but not a stranger either- but we can save that for another post).

I slowly began to ‘Check-In’ to the various locations that I visit throughout my day. The train station, my work, various shopping establishments (umm well I don’t go shopping everyday..) and so on. However, after 100s of check-ins, my interest has slowly waned. I haven’t received many tips from other users (granted I haven’t added my entire network) and I don’t see many offers or incentives being offered by vendors.

Is it because it’s still too new and that there isn’t much participation yet here in Montreal? Is it just a matter of time before it becomes widely adopted?

That being said, I do see value for vendors when people broadcast their check-ins in their Twitter stream because it often reminds me of a place I want to go or hadn’t heard of.

Is it only a matter of time?

About two weeks ago, I joined another network called Empire Avenue because I saw some mentions in my stream and I was curious to find out more. I still can’t quite figure it out but I do know that they had a ‘shareholders’ meeting recently (which I couldn’t attend) and I’m all for local networks which encourage networking/connecting online and meeting offline. I’m going to keep an eye on this one. (And it’s Canadian!)

Question: Are we joining too many networks and waiting for something to happen?
Are you getting value out of all the networks you participate in?