Android has a bunch of apps that do muting based on location (and Tasker can do pretty much anything on the phone based on pretty much anything else), but don't they put a drain on the battery?
Not sure on Android. On the iPhone when you develop a location app, you can decide what level of location resolution you need. If it's limited to just using WiFi and the cell tower triangulation, power draw would likely not be noticeable especially with the daily charge cycle most smartphone owners have. Only when you go for full GPS based location does power draw start to become a concern. Polling time would also impact how much power the app would use. Something set to once every few minutes would again probably not be all that bad.
The Symbian app my friend had worked purely based on cell triangulation, and he didn't see any noticeable reduction in battery life by using it, since the phone is constantly keeping an eye on cell towers anyhow.
Power wise with WiFi, I did do a recent test on an iPod touch, letting it sit connected to a WiFi point and always ready to accept an incoming Facetime call. It lasted over a week before it alerted that the battery was below 20%. Though I'm not sure how much more power draw is involved when a WiFi device is searching out other base stations for location vs staying connected to one.
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