Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Takes On FourSquare
An anonymous reader writes "Facebook Places is similar to FourSquare. You can go to places, 'check-in' so your friends know you're there, rate them, comment on them, and generally spew your opinions all over the internet as fast as your fingers can hit the keys. It's an obvious attempt by the company to muscle in on FourSquare's block, casting its influence ever further over us all." Now the question is, who at FourSquare turned down the offer, and how badly are they crapping their pants?
If Facebook takes over an app I never heard of or ever will use, and some blogger tries to tenuously relate it to the totalitarian state taking over our lives, and a tree falls on a mime in the woods, and I go on using email and ignoring Facebook like I know so many other people do, do I care?
I know what people do with it, but why do they do it?
Living With a Nerd
I use Facebook all the time. I've never heard of Foursquare. Is this another one of those "I use it, therefore I assume everybody uses it" kind of things?
I know what people do with it, but why do they do it?
The same could be said of that post you just posted. I know what you do on Slashdot but why do you do it?
And I think the answer is very simple: communication with a nominal reward. People love debate and communication and giving advice and the like. Just because FourSquare focuses on restaurants and eateries doesn't make it any less pointless than our banter and talk of tech here on Slashdot. It simply has a different target market. It might be bigger, it might be smaller but it's something evidently.
"I'm Mayor of the 1st St. Chipotle" vs "I just got a +5 Insightful on this post!" Simple meaningless reward that means something to the user.
Think of it like a game. Personally I think it's worthless but I wouldn't consider myself very keen on the internet if I didn't realize what it does effectively and how it appeals to the users. Of course that means eyeballs and of course Facebook wants their users to lock in and stay. Maybe they'll make a native FourSquare to Facebook to appeal to that market?
My work here is dung.
I use foursquare and it can be quite helpful when in a new town for a night of partying.
And now we know why regular slashdotters don't use it...
When you're afraid to download music illegally in your own home, then the terrorists have won!
>>Do you also avoid consumer reviews of products when you go to buy something? That seems like a bad idea. It seems equally silly to refuse to look at ratings of something like a restaurant you might want to try for the first time.
There's Zagat, Metro Times, and hundres of other resources for that.
>>Even just the fact a lot of people have checked into a place means it must be decent.
Oh, no no no no. That's completely wrong. I assume that people check into McDonald's and Starbucks all the time. And what's the demographic for Foursquare? Younger people? The ones who think all corporations are evil? That saving a single dollar is a make-it-or-break-it proposition? People that think they deserve everything for merely having been born? Not the same demographic, and thus very unlikely to have the same tastes. Your statement is kind of like, "Even just the fact that a lot of people voted for him means that he must be decent." The masses have no taste, especially the younger masses.
--Jim (me)
The funny thing is that there is a startup called Pelago that was creating a knockoff of Four Square too. Guess they are dead in the water.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
The only thing Facebook hasn't tried to buy is 4chan.
Watch, now that I said that... the next hot new product == facebook.com/b/
Acquisition of 4chan could only increase the intellectual value of Failbook.
Probably the same person that had decided that no one uses text messages anymore and supporting non-smartphones is not worth their time and non-smartphones supposedly no longer exist.
As it is I migrated to BrightKite a long time ago because their interface just worked better and I was never really interested in the gaming aspect of Foursquare. To me it's just a social proprioception tool.
My use case in case anyone wants to know. I have a tight knit group of friends and for 90% of my checkins only they get the updates. Conversly, I only get their alerts sent to me. Where this is useful, for me, is if I say go to the mall on Saturday.
*I check-in at the mall cause I need new socks.
*Fifteen minutes later friend A checks in at the mall
*This check-in generates an alert which gets SMS'd to my phone "A has checked in where you are!"
*I sms Friend A : "Hey I'm at the mall too. Why don't we grab lunch at Restaurant X?"
There, with little effort I now have a coincidental meet-up with a friend over lunch; this has significantly made my trip to the mall more enjoyable than just hunting for a good deal on socks. Silly, perhaps, but for all you know it maybe a friend I don't get to see that much offline.
Code softly but carry a big magnet.
"I never used Foursquare, because it reminds of the game the retarded kids have to play at recess."
Yes, because any activity involving even the slightest bit of exercise is only for the "retarded".
You missed the point. Before the PCification of elementary schools, it was possible to play keep away, smear the queer, some other violent games whose name escapes me. Catholic grade school was like a war zone during recess but only fun. Every game was phsyically demanding. So when everything got banned the girls were like, "Well, can we still play 4 square?". "Uhm, yeah, 4 square is OK."
You.
i.e. People.
The technologies may be cool. The potential may be amazing. But you know what? They have to make it for the average person. And that means the lowest common denominator.
You think you're going to be able to find that little local restaurant among all the shit that people think is wonderful when the masses arrive in droves on those systems? No. What you're going to see is Mcdonalds, Starbucks, TGI Fridays etc etc because they are the ones paying to be on the first lines your screen when you search for nearby restaurants or coffee.
So, if you're using Ovi Maps find places features on your phone just now and finding all these cool places, enjoy it while you can. Give it a year or two and there will be a hundred million other punters insisting that the starbucks on the corner make the best coffee in town.
What makes some of us jaded is not the technology. It's people.
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