We are happy to announce that MapQuest has officially launched the new version of the MapQuest Toolbar that now includes Loki to power their “Find Me” functionality. “Find Me” allows users of the toolbar to instantly locate themselves to deliver the most relevant and simplest mapping experience on the web. MapQuest is the largest mapping website in the US and we are excited to be working with them to drive auto-location on the web.

Check it out and let us know your thoughts.

http://blog.mapquest.com/2009/03/12/how-the-new-toolbar-and-on-map-search-tool-from-mapquest-saved-m/

I created an account on Twitter for Loki the other day. Some smaller announcements will be posted there so be sure to follow me to get all the latest news.

http://twitter.com/lokidotcom

Today we announced a number of new partners that are using Loki to power their sites and drive a location-aware experience for their users.

Be sure to head over to their sites and use Loki to discover the world around you. Below are snippets from the press release…

Geocaching.com is the world’s largest geocache listing site with over 3 million participants worldwide. “Loki allows us to deliver location-specific geocaching search results without a user needing to submit their location. This is just another way in which we can support our community, allowing geocachers access to information in a way that best serves them,” said Jeremy Irish, Groundspeak’s president and CEO.

Krillion is a premier provider of local shopping search information, serving today’s ready-to-buy consumers who research products online for purchase from retailers in their neighborhood. Krillion’s success comes from its ability to provide online shoppers with real-time, location-specific product availability information from major retailers in the U.S. “Loki’s technology provides us with the ability to instantly locate the user who is researching products online, show them the closest retail outlets with the item in stock and, most importantly, provide instant directions from their exact location to the store,” said Joel Toledano, CEO and founder of Krillion.

FireEagle is the secure and stylish way to share your location with sites and services online. We want to make the whole web respond to where you are, and to help you discover more about the world around you. See the announcement from earlier too.

Whrrl (Loki integration is not launched yet), a new social discovery service from Pelago, Inc. uses elements of social networking, local discovery and user-generated content to create a unique medium for finding and sharing local information with friend networks. Whrrl delivers real-time updates, reviews and locations of people, places and events in the physical world through both Web and mobile platform. “It is crucial for us to deliver seamless location experiences - whether via mobile device or a laptop - and Loki allows us to do that through some very impressive geotargeting capabilities,” said Darren Vengroff, CTO and co-founder of Pelago.

CitySquares is a local Boston company that brings together local businesses and their consumers to provide rich, hyper-local content for urban and suburban communities. With its recent expansion, CitySquares’ footprint extends from Boston to the Route 128 belt and offers information on over 65,000 local businesses.

UpNext is the new and exciting way to explore and discover your city in 3D. Rather than sifting through pages and links of data, UpNext enables you to glide around your city, virtually. Exploring has never been easier.

We are happy to announce, in conjunction with the Where 2.0 conference, that we have just launched support for Yahoo! FireEagle and Twitter in MyLoki. Just log into your MyLoki account, head over to the Share page and enable integration for both.

If you are at Where2.0, be sure to stop by our booth and say hi.

A bunch of us from Loki and Skyhook will be at Where 2.0 and WhereCamp next week and Skyhook will be a sponsor of both events.

We will have a Loki booth at Where 2.0 and we will be demoing a number of great products from our partners that have integrated Loki functionality into the applications and sites. Be sure to stop by the booth and check it out.

I was waiting to announce it until the official press release came out but TechCrunch and Mashable both have coverage on the launch so I might as well post now.

In this launch we take MyLoki out of a private beta and open it up to anyone that wants to sign up and play with it. We also update Loki Toolbar to version 2.2 which adds MyLoki integration for automatic updates and new platform support. We now officially support Internet Explorer and Firefox on Windows XP, Windows Vista and OS X. And Loki Mobile gets in on the update now and makes it officially to 1.0. We now support the same WiFi location goodiness on Windows Mobile 5 and Symbian S60.

For those of you who haven’t heard of or used MyLoki its a new service to go along with Loki Toolbar and Loki Mobile that allows you to easily share your current location with friends using things like RSS, Badges for your blog or email and Facebook. I use the Map badge in my sidebar so you can know exactly where I am at any time. I also have a Location Feed that uses GeoRSS and exports the current city I am in.

We are also really excited to work with the great team over at FireEagle, the new Yahoo geolocation brokering service. If you have Loki installed, you can use it to automatically set your location and we will eventually be working with them to help publish directly to their service.

So go check out MyLoki, download Loki and add the Loki Facebook app…

Skyhook Wireless is in the news. Check out some of the recent coverage of Wi-Fi location on the iPhone and iPod touch in the Boston Globe and USA Today (with photos and a video podcast!).

I’ve never seen a better video podcast in my life. I’ve seen a lot of video podcasts.

That’s what Steve Jobs had to say in the Macworld keynote about the new Wi-Fi location positioning feature on iPhone and iPod touch. Using Skyhook Wireless’ location technology, iPhone and iPod touch users can now locate themselves in the Maps application with the tap of one button.

Isn’t that cool?

To get it now, simply upgrade your iPhone or iPod touch to the latest firmware now available through iTunes. Select Maps, and then click the locate me button. Use it to find your location, get directions, and search locally.

It’s really cool.