Recently, a web/tech/PR news and innovations site called ReadWriteWeb made the claim that what once was a craze in the social media world and on smart phones everywhere – “checking-in” – is dying and on its way out of the social media landscape faster than most thought.

The site determined that in July of last year, Foursquare (a giant in the world of social media tracking) had 2 million users and 1 million check-ins every day. By the end of 2010 those check-ins had risen to 5 million users and 2 million check-ins per day. That may seem good at first glance, but it shows that less than half of the users are currently active on their accounts. And this is the norm across the board on many social networking platforms.

So the question is: why are people not checking in as much on social networking sites like Foursquare, Facebook, Gowalla, and Yelp as they were a year ago?

As an individual, the main purpose for checking in is to find people and friends near your location, to get rewards from brands via your location, to recall where you have been and stores/restaurants you’ve visited, and for branding yourself – in other words, bragging to your friends in the social media realm where you are, or where you’ve been.

I can see the value of checking in to engage with both friends and brands. And while I am an advocate of social media and believe in its marketing power for many brands, I have to agree with ReadWriteWeb’s analysis of the slowly diminishing power of checking in – the numbers don’t lie. It might be just another flash in the pan. Anyone remember MySpace?