Get STD Tested, Then Check in on Foursquare!

MTV's campaign may not work...but if it does, bravo

By Evann Gastaldo, Newser Staff

Posted Sep 1, 2010 12:04 PM CDT

(Newser) – If you’re as obsessed with location-based services as most people seem to be, you probably love checking in at restaurants, coffee shops, bars…and STD clinics? Maybe not, but that’s what MTV is hoping you’ll do as it launches its “Get Yourself Tested” Foursquare campaign. The network is encouraging teens to get tested, then check in on Foursquare to tell everyone that’s what they’re doing. They’ll get a special “GYT” badge for doing it!

Tracy Clark-Flory remembers getting tested as a teenager, “and the prospect of announcing it to the entire world would have sent me running for the hills,” she writes on Salon. Even so, this campaign is a step in the right direction when it comes to removing “the stigma around STD testing.” Even the prize—those who score the badge can win a trip to New York City—is a good move: “It's much easier to explain a clinic visit as an attempt to win a silly contest than it is to tell your parents that you're having sex.”

Workers at a Planned Parenthood clinic hang a banner to announce the opening of the facility October 2, 2007 in Aurora, Illinois. (Getty Images)

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Get STD Tested, Then Check in on Foursquare!

MTV's campaign may not work...but if it does, bravo

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Get STD Tested, Then Check in on Foursquare!

MTV's campaign may not work...but if it does, bravo

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OTHER STORIES ON OUR RADAR

social networking • MTV • STD • location-based services • sexually transmitted diseases • Foursquare

MOST POPULAR STORIES

[ By Views ]

[ By Comments ]

More Newser Stories

Top Apps Download Your Whole Address Book

Twitter, Path blamed in privacy controversy

Gonorrhea Becoming 'Incurable'

STD mutating so fast that antibiotics can't keep up

Facebook Kills 'Places'

But location will soon be front and center in all posts

Obama Checks In on Foursquare

Prez becomes highest-profile user of social networking site

First Drug-Resistant Strain of Gonorrhea Discovered

'Superbug' could spread globally within decades

About Us

Site

Newser By Users

Community

Site Maps

Tools

More News

What is Newser?