yo, IM home and all the lights are on!

If you haven't heard about this new Web site yet, pull up a chair. Because you might make the next list of "new opportunities" of empty homes available for pilfering.

A new Web site, called PleaseRobMe.com, pulls information from social networking sites like Twitter, Foursquare and Google Buzz, that indicates that the user is not home. It then posts that message and the user's whereabouts (if known) online for all to see.

For example, you just sent a Twitter, like poor ole' @donagher did, saying "I'm at Specialty's Cafe and Bakery - Mountain View," and now anyone who knows @donagher, knows he's not home. Would-be thieves can filter by location or Twitter name. Yikes.

The Dutch developers, Barry Borsboom, Boy van Amstel and Frank Groeneveld say they like social networking, but that their goal is to shine a giant spotlight on the dangerous side-effects of location sharing.

Yo. I'm home and all of the lights and cameras are on.

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