With the holiday shopping season just hours away, I’ll use this space today to direct your attention to a completely misguided effort to leverage mobile location. Starting this Friday, two U.S. malls will track users’ location to see how they move throughout the shopping centers and how much time they spend in specific stores. And while the data collected is anonymous, the only way users can opt out is by turning off their cellphones. Privacy is still a very sensitive subject when it comes to location, but demanding that consumers make a choice between being tracked (without receiving anything of value in exchange) and using their phones at all is short-sighted and offensive. I’m guessing this effort will fail as savvy consumers find somewhere else to shop.