I think these check in services are still in infancy - and neither foursquare nor gowalla fix real-world problems.

For example, my wife and I went for dinner yesterday. We ended up at Pier 39th. Which restaurant to chose? What are the specials? Which ones are open? Any coupons? Prices (meaning actual prices in $$)? Menu? We tried Yelp! - fail (there are ~10 restaurant in Pier 39 but Yelp! was tell us to walk 1 mile). We tried Foursquare - useless.

BTW, I'm experimenting something on http://wall.si but I still don't have clue how to do it right.