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Apply HN: Kohapp – Helping friends hangout without the hassle

4 points by manishk ↗ HN
We are trying to make it easy for friends to hangout with each other and have fun. There are various instances where we decide to hangout with our friends but face the following problems in doing so:

- Long calls/texts/chats to decide on a place to meet and even after all that there is no surety that a decision is made. This is the biggest problem while planning a hangout. - No easy way of checking which all friends are coming and which are not. - Deciding on a date/time that suits everyone.

Even if going through all the above problems was not enough while planning, there is one other major problem at the actual hangout place. We all have those friends who never reach on time and we end up calling/texting/chat (again) to enquire about there ETA (everyone hates to wait :))

All these issues are not only painstaking but a waste of time as well. Kohapp helps to solve all of them under one roof through the help of technology. Its an app to plan/organize hangouts in 3 simple steps without need of calling/text/chat.

We are currently in development and hope to launch in the coming months.

http://facebook.com/kohapp

7 comments

[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 29.8 ms ] thread
thehorbach
Hi, seems interesting, but I was thinking what separates you from the default Facebook events or when a user needs to post an update about the time he is coming?
manishk
I think facebook events is more catered towards events i.e weddings, parties etc and not the weekly casual hangouts we do with our friends. Moreover I haven't met a lot of users who actually use it despite it being around for a long time.

About your question, the user doesn't have to enter any information for ETA. The app calculates that based on the hangout destination and your current location.

thehorbach
well in that case have you considered the battery usage? I mean doing even the simplest mapping in the background could drain so much of battery life.
manishk
We have worked on making the tracking part as efficient as possible(code optimizations). Also the tracking will be on for a very limited time 45 mins to 1 hour(around decided time to meet) and the interval for location updates will not be very small hence helping in battery preservation.
josephpmay
This is more of a pitching tip than a question/feedback, but you talk a lot about what the problem is without really going into what your app does/solution entails. Getting friends together is a pretty obvious problem, and I'd like to know how you're addressing it.
manishk
Hi.. I just posted about our solution in the comments section.
manishk
Here are the details about the solution: The app will ask users to select 1) Friends they want to go out with 2) Choose a datetime that they like to suggest 3) Select a place from list of places shown by the app based on interest(food, entertainment, activities etc). The app then notifies selected friends via notification(if they already are a user) or sms(first time invite). The others in the hangout can suggest their own place/datetime and also say yes/no for the invite.

Due to the decisive nature of the app(yes or no) and no chat will result in much faster and decisive planning. Also the app will broadcast location updates to the users of the hangout along with ETA for a certain period of time at the decided time of hangout.