I can't entirely agree that there is deja vu. When Facebook and LinkedIn came out, there was an immediate market not to mention Facebook's incredible growth, so

I can't entirely agree that there is deja vu. When Facebook and LinkedIn came out, there was an immediate market not to mention Facebook's incredible growth, something Foursquare/Gowalla don't have. When Twitter first came out there was no initial growth and out of nowhere it boomed, which I blame on media and as of now there is no monetary value in Twitter (though technically it's there with all of the information on trends and social impact that can be visualized through Tweets and Twitter as a general Marketing/PR tool). Foursquare/Gowalla on the other hand, don't offer entirely different from FB Places other than a 'fun' aspect that FB can easily mimic. Till yesterday location services were not awesome. No one really used it. It's inconvenient to use. I don't use it and only 1% of my friends do. Now that FB entered the space yes it is bad because it's even more difficult for people to break out of the shell lest they come up with something to offer. If it were me, I would throw in a "want to check-in" feature. That way you can express a desire to go somewhere and amass a party to go with you instead of checking in and have people say "oh, that place is cool".