Shopkick, a San Francisco startup with $20 million in venture backing from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Greylock Partners, today introduced an iPhone app that allows users to earn rewards by visiting retail locations such as American Eagle Outfitters, Best Buy, Macy’s, the Sports Authority, and malls owned by Simon Property Group. The service—a variation on the now-ubiquitous Foursquare- and Gowalla-style mobile check-in—delivers points called “kickbucks” to users who enter stores equipped with a special Shopkick wireless device. The startups says kickbucks can be redeemed for gift cards, magazine subscriptions, iPods, Facebook credits, or donations to charity. Shopkick’s system went live today in stores in New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, and will soon be added to stores in Chicago and other cities.
Author: Wade Roush
Between 2007 and 2014, I was a staff editor for Xconomy in Boston and San Francisco.
Since 2008 I've been writing a weekly opinion/review column called VOX: The Voice of Xperience. (From 2008 to 2013 the column was known as World Wide Wade.)
I've been writing about science and technology professionally since 1994. Before joining Xconomy in 2007, I was a staff member at MIT’s Technology Review from 2001 to 2006, serving as senior editor, San Francisco bureau chief, and executive editor of TechnologyReview.com. Before that, I was the Boston bureau reporter for Science, managing editor of supercomputing publications at NASA Ames Research Center, and Web editor at e-book pioneer NuvoMedia.
I have a B.A. in the history of science from Harvard College and a PhD in the history and social study of science and technology from MIT. I've published articles in Science, Technology Review, IEEE Spectrum, Encyclopaedia Brittanica, Technology and Culture, Alaska Airlines Magazine, and World Business, and I've been a guest of NPR, CNN, CNBC, NECN, WGBH and the PBS NewsHour. I'm a frequent conference participant and enjoy opportunities to moderate panel discussions and on-stage chats.
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