I don’t have plans to visit any of these cities in the near future, but I’ve followed them all in case I do end up visiting. That way I’ll be able to quickly pull up the local list and know exactly which places I should hit while I’m in town.

• Alabama
  The Shoals: Must-visit Places in the Shoals, AL #visitUS
• Arizona
  Phoenix: Must Do Phoenix, AZ #VisitUS
• California
  Carlsbad: The Best of Carlsbad, CA #VisitUS #4sq
  Long Beach: Historic Long Beach #VisitUS
  Los Angeles: Essential Los Angeles #VisitUS
  Los Angeles: Los Angeles by an LA Local
• Connecticut
  Stamford: Best of Stamford, CT! #visitUS
• Florida
  Fort Lauderdale: Local Favorites in Fort Lauderdale #VisitUS
  Saint Petersburg: Guide to Saint Petersburg’s best spots
  Tampa: Must visit Places in Tampa #visitUS
• Georgia
  Roswell: Visit Roswell, GA
  Savannah: Best Spots to Visit in Savannah #visitUS
  St. Marys: St. Marys, GA! 2nd oldest city in the US! #visitUS
• Indiana
  Indianapolis: The Best Places in Indianapolis – #VisitUs
• Iowa
  Des Moines: #visitUS in Des Moines, IA.
• Maine
  Portland: Awesome Stops in Portland, Maine #VisitUS
• Maryland
  Baltimore: Charms of Baltimore #visitUS #4sq
  Baltimore: Charm City’s Finest
• Massachusetts
  Boston: I Think I’ll Go To Boston… #visitUS
  Cambridge: The Best Spots in Cambridge, MA! #visitUS
• Michigan
  Detroit: Detroit List #VisitUS
  Kalamazoo: Kalamazoo’s best spots #visitUS
• Minnesota
  Minneapolis: Best Spots in Minneapolis, MN!
  Rochester: #VisitUS in Rah Rah Rochester, MN
  St. Paul: Best Spots in St. Paul, MN!
• Missouri
  Kansas City: Kansas City, Mo. – A Great Place To Be – #VisitUS
  St. Louis: Best places to visit in St. Louis, MO #visitUS
• New Hampshire
  Portsmouth: The Best Spots in Portsmouth, NH! #visitUS
  Portsmouth: Portsmouth Wine List #visitUS
  Portsmouth: My Favorite Portsmouth Spots
• New Mexico
  Albuquerque: Duke City Badge!
• New York
  Buffalo: Must see places in Buffalo for tourists #visitUS
  Buffalo: Best of Buffalo, NY #visitUS
• North Carolina
  Charlotte: #visitUS in Charlotte, NC!
  Raleigh: Raleigh #visitUS
• Ohio
  Cincinnati: Cincinnati for Out-of-Towners #VisitUS
  Cincinnati: Fine Dining in Cincinnati, OH #visitUS
  Cincinnati: The Fine Arts of Cincinnati, OH #visitUS
  Cincinnati: #VisitUS #VisitCincinnati
  Cleveland: #HappyInCLE #visitUS
  Lake County: Lake County, OH – There’s More to Explore #visitUS
  Toledo: More to Explore in Toledo #visitUS
• Oklahoma
  Oklahoma City: Oklahoma City’s Best! #visitUS
• Pennsylvania
  Bucks County: Must-See Spots in Bucks County, PA! #visitUS
  Hershey/Harrisburg: Sweet Spots of Hershey Harrisburg, PA #visitUS #4s (Check out the tips on this one; each one revolves around a president somehow)
  Philadelphia: Badge of Brotherly Love #visitUS
  Pittsburgh: The Best of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania #visitUS
  Scranton: The Essentials of Scranton, PA
• South Carolina
  Columbia: Columbia, SC’s #FamouslyHot Spots | #visitUS
  Columbia: Best Spots in Columbia, SC #visitUS
• Tennessee
  Nashville: Nashville, so much to do #visitUS
• Texas
  Austin: EXPLORE Austin! @visitUS
  Corpus Christi: Corpus Christi, Bottom of the Map #VisitUS
  Dallas: Dallas: Live Large, Think Big #visitUS
  Houston: Houston, We Support Local, Grow Together #visitUS
  Plano: Places to Go & Things to Do in Plano, TX #VisitUS
  San Antonio: San Antonio – Get Full. Have Fun. #visitUS #4sq
  Sugar Land: Best of Sugar Land #visitUS
• Vermont
  Burlington: Burlington, Vermont
• Virginia
  Richmond: Your City Guide to RVA #VisitUS (Richmond, VA)
• Wisconsin
  Milwaukee: Cooler by the Lake in Milwaukee, WI! #visitUS
  Milwaukee: Milwaukee, WI #visitUS

I’ve left out lists that don’t include tips and photos for most of the venues, because that’s really the beauty of foursquare lists. A simple list of places doesn’t hold much meaning by itself.

If you’re curious, Anthony Rodriguez has been keeping a ranking of the most followed lists. That, of course, is just one component of the judging, but it is interesting to see which have been the best promoted.

Which list is your favorite? Have I missed any that should be on this list?

/Map CC licensed by leiris202 on Flickr.

This year’s badge will be a Super Swarm Sunday badge, featuring the usual swarm badge design, but the bees are replaced by tiny footballs. It doesn’t appear there’s any connection to the NFL for 2012, so you won’t see separate badges for your favorite team or for actually attending the game.

You’ll be able to unlock the badge when you check in to the worldwide “Super Swarm Sunday” venue from the foursquare app. It will begin appearing a few hours before the game and will be active for the remainder of the night.

Foursquare’s servers have come a long way in the past year. Hopefully we won’t see a repeat of last February when they saw numerous instances of downtime during the game brought on by the crush of people checking in to earn their badges.

130,000 people checked in last year during the Super Bowl. Since then foursquare’s user base has more than doubled. With the combination of a compelling special (who doesn’t love pizza?) and a badge, we should see even better numbers this year.

What do you think of the badge and the Super Swarm Sunday promotion?

The badge is a promotion for MTS’ deal with Karo Cinemas, the country’s largest chain of movie theaters. MTS subscribers are eligible for buy one, get one free movie tickets on Tuesdays.

To unlock the badge, users must check in at one of the Karo Cinemas locations.

Foursquare offers translations of many of their badge unlock messages in the languages they support (Russian is one of them), but it’s the first time the primary unlock language has been something other than English. It’s not a huge leap, but it does show that foursquare is beginning to put a serious focus on non-US users and brands.

What do you think of the new badge?

PS If you’re wondering why the badge says “MTC,” it’s because that’s their Russian name. MTS is the English version.

The reason I’m writing about it is the apology letter they sent to the handful of people who picked up the badge. Here’s the letter they received:

Hi there,

A quick apology: you probably noticed that you were one of a small group of people who unlocked the PA Groundhog Day 2012 badge a day early. We here at foursquare HQ get a little overexcited whenever cute small animals are involved, especially when they’re forecasting the coming spring! We fixed it so nobody else will unlock it early, but you get to keep the early entry in your Trophy Case.

Thanks for your understanding! Enjoy Groundhog Day (again) tomorrow!

- team foursquare

It’s a letter they didn’t have to write, but to me, the fact they did (and took the extra time to have some fun with it) speaks volumes about the company’s culture.

In the almost two years I’ve been writing this blog, I’ve had the opportunity to speak to people at every level of the company. Every single one of them is passionate about foursquare and enjoys what they do.

Their passion is infectious. In my opinion, that’s the reason foursquare has built such a dedicated following. It’s the reason thousands of superusers help to keep the place in order. It’s the reason users convince businesses they frequent to come on board. And it’s the reason I continue to write about it on a daily basis.

/Thanks to Amoreena for sharing the letter — and to you guys for bearing with me through a little bit of meaningless commentary!

This year, you’ll be able to save a little money on your Super Bowl pizza order thanks to foursquare and American Express. When you check in to the nationwide Super Swarm (just like the one foursquare offered for last year’s Super Bowl), you’ll be eligible for $5 off at Pizza Hut when you pay for $10 worth of pizza with your American Express.

The process is the same as other American Express promotions: just open the special after you check in and tap “Load to Card” and then pay with your American Express. You’ll receive confirmation via foursquare within a few minutes of your card being charged and then a statement credit within a few business days.

In a new twist, foursquare will be providing a link to sync your card with American Express for those who haven’t previously synced up, making it easy for people who weren’t previously aware of the American Express specials to take advantage of the offer.

The beauty of these deals is that the guy at your local Pizza Hut doesn’t need to know anything (and he almost certainly won’t know anything) or do anything for you to take advantage of the offer. You don’t have to clip a coupon and present it to your deliver driver. And best of all, it doesn’t exclude any other coupons you do have and want to use. As long as you activate the special, pay with your American Express and spend more than $10, you’ll get the credit.

Pizza Hut has offered foursquare specials in the past, but pizza delivery is one of those categories that’s usually excluded from foursquare specials since you never really visit the store to check in. It’s another in a series of innovative ways American Express and foursquare have been able to work together to offer frictionless discounts.

This week they covered:

• New badges: Kicks, Madrid, City Badge Contest
• American Express offers $5 discounts during LA Restaurant Week
• New introduction video distances foursquare from check-ins; moves toward recommendations
• Brand pages become more chain-friendly
• Shouter! iPhone app lets you shout on foursquare
• Privatesquare lets you maintain your own check-in database
• ReserveMyCity helps you make reservations when you put restaurants on your to-do list
• Let mom know you’re OK with HashtagMom
• 99 cent foursQR iPhone app checks you in on foursquare with a QR code

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I recently checked out foursQR on the iPhone and it’s a pretty good solution for iPhone users. No, it’s not the answer for everyone, but it works very well in certain cases.

You can quickly create a PDF QR code sticker on foursQR’s site for any venue and put it wherever you like – provided you have the owner’s permission of course.

What’s it good for? Any place that you check in often and that you control. I’ve put one on the wall next to my desk at the office. I can check in using foursQR in less than 10 seconds thanks to its automatic check-in function at places I’ve added as favorites. It’s a fast and easy process.

So, what isn’t it good for? Well, everything else. Unless you’re good friends with the owner, it’s unlikely you’ll get permission to put one of these up at any of your favorite businesses and it’s unlikely that any business will put one up on their own.

Why? Because the QR codes are proprietary to foursQR’s app — and the app costs 99 cents.

If you scan the code in any regular QR code app, you’ll be taken to a mobile web page that offers you the option of downloading foursQR (if you’re on an iPhone) or loading the venue in your foursquare mobile app. Needless to say, by that point you’re not saving any time at all over just starting out in the foursquare app.

In addition, foursQR’s codes aren’t compatible with the QR codes that function pretty well on Android devices (and recently in 4th & Mayor on Windows Phone 7). Those codes are able to link directly to the foursquare app. Unfortunately they degrade to the awful foursquare mobile site (no, not even the touch-based version that brands can use) on iPhone and Blackberry, making them of little practical use.

We’re still a long way from the day when users across all platforms will be able to check in using NFC, so for now QR codes are the next best thing. Sadly, no one’s come up with one that works across every platform without requiring some proprietary app. Until they do, it’s highly unlikely any business will put one in their doorway.

It’s also unlikely that we’ll ever see QR codes come natively to the official foursquare apps. In an interview with Fast Company’s Austin Carr during last year’s Social Media Week, foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley said:

I’ve never really been bullish on QR codes. It’s hard enough to get people into checking in. It’s a tough sell for people.

foursQR is a nice app for what it does. I really like using it to check in at my office, but that’s about where the utility stops. Beyond that, it’s not of much use.

The app is available for 99 cents in the iTunes app store. If you’ve got a place you check in to regularly where you can put one of the stickers, give it a try and let us know what you think in the comments.

Since joining foursquare, I’ve longed for a way for my mom to be on the service so she’d know I was safe just by watching my checkins. With her eight-year-old phone and complete inability to understand even the whole “texty” thing, it’s clear that’s not going to happen.

Now it doesn’t have to, thanks to a brilliant new foursquare API app called HashtagMom. When you add “#mom” to a check-in, it automatically gives her a call, lets her know you’re safe and reads her whatever shout you added to the check-in.

She even has the option to leave a message for you that will be delivered to your email.

If your mom is a little more tech-savvy and understands “texty,” you can opt to have HashtagMom simply send her a text instead of calling.

This is a wonderful idea because it addresses every mother’s greatest fear in a way that’s convenient and easy for us to integrate into something we’re doing anyway. Now I just need a HashtagWife service that sends my wife a text that says “I’m at the grocery store, do we need anything?”

What do you think of HashtagMom? Would you use it or would it just annoy your mom that you didn’t take the time to call yourself?

Foursquare launched a change to their brand pages last night that makes the pages much more friendly to chains.

When claimed venues are linked to a brand page, users now get a map showing all the nearest stores from the particular chain right on the page. A new box has been added that shows which of their friends have visited any of the chain’s stores.

On the venue pages, each store that’s part of a chain now also gets a box that shows its three nearest sister stores and a link back to the page. This makes it easy to find another nearby store that might be more convenient.

For chains whose venues were already claimed by a page, the venues are already linked. For chains without a page, it’s easy to link venues to a new page either one by one or in bulk.

These features work the same for colleges, too.

Brand pages were once recommended mainly for companies that didn’t have physical locations, but they’ve become more and more common for chains. With these new features, they’re now a must, since they really tie all of a company’s venues together. Expect even more benefits when these features trickle down to the mobile apps.

What do you think of the change?

Foursquare last night unveiled a new video that appears on their logged out homepage. It gives users a sense of what foursquare is really about, but perhaps most telling are the things that aren’t mentioned.

As you’d expect, the new video focuses heavily on the recommendations aspect of foursquare. It also speaks to keeping up with your friends with photos and comments and redeeming deals offered by local businesses. In the 59 second video, “check in” is used exactly once (and then only in reference to unlocking specials).

Compare that to their previous video, created in April of 2010:

Checking in is mentioned at least five times by name, and referred to in other ways a few more times than that. Badges, points and mayorships take up a hefty portion of the old video, but you won’t find a single mention of them in the new one.

With this video, foursquare has distanced themselves as far as they can from many of the things they originally became known for, when they were often referred to as a “check-in service” or a “location-based game.” It now reflects more closely what foursquare’s founders wanted to build all along — a social city guide — and lays out exactly where the service is headed.

When you look at those two videos side by side, it almost appears that the company has executed one of the most artful startup pivots ever, but that’s not the case at all. Those check-ins, points, badges and mayorships were never anything more than a ploy to get people to keep pulling out their phones and sending their location to foursquare, all while the company was building up the huge data set they needed to power recommendations and other features.

Listen closely to the old video and you’ll hear a lot of the same ideas presented in the new one, like recommendations and “making your city easier to use.” There’s no mistaking that foursquare was on exactly the same path then as they are now.

Sure, the badges and mayorships are a fun diversion, but the real meat of foursquare has been, and always will be, the tips and recommendations they’re able to provide. Foursquare won’t kill the gaming aspects anytime soon (if ever), but they’ll continue to take a back seat.

So, is the check-in dead? No, not at all. It’s evolving. Foursquare has transitioned to a service where you can get value, in the form of recommendations, without ever checking in. Check-ins, though, will remain an important part of the service. They keep the huge data monster fed and happy, after all. Foursquare must (and no doubt will) find ways to make checking in a more natural act to keep them coming.

In many ways, this video is the culmination of everything we’ve seen from foursquare over the last few weeks. They’re finally coming out of the closet, so to speak, and telling the world what they’re really about. It’s been a long time coming.

PS I think I’m in love with the dancing burrito.