Ask HN: What problem does Foursquare/Gowalla/Places solve?
One of the most repeated advice for startups is build something people want, something that solves a problem. What problem do these services solve? They are just games/tools for sharing where I am right now. It's fun, but I can live without it. I get that there's value for business owners, but that's just a byproduct, at least I percieve it that way. For a regular user who is just checking-in, there's no real value.
So, what problem do they solve?
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[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 121 ms ] threadthis is no game. it is big stuff, close to the localisation trend. very linked to mobile world obviously. google/twitter/facebook are all going in the localisation in order to get data closer to the user. They are more likely to be relevant to them.
possible usage scenarios
"where are my friends"
"i like this personn, oh this personn is going there, oh i dunno this place, maybe i will like this place"
"oh you went to this bar ? i like it too. ask bob the barman to give you one drink on the house, i know him"
obviously once the arch is setup, it is possible to push local store ads on this. It think local-store ads on the internet will be huge, once the arch is setup, so not soon, but in a few years.
The deployment of local ads is slow, because you need to get local stores to actually advertize... and they are not used to it. This is my understanding of it at least. aka "the market is not yet ready".
Second, you're being overly demanding, I think, even about "solves a problem." We could do a whole song and dance about the human need for fun, but that would be beside the point. When you say "It's fun, but I can live without it," you changed the terms of the whole debate. We started with "solves a problem," but tons of things solve problems and yet you can live without them.
Finally, I'm pretty sure that there is a real category "invented needs" (or "invented desires", if you prefer), and that lots of webapps fall into that category. The existence of the product creates the need (desire) after the fact.
As for not lasting or people flocking to the next hot thing, that sounds about right to me for many faddish things that you find and play with on the internet, no?
I did spend some time using an earlier location-based social network and the problem it had was this: you don't know what check-ins are general invitations to come and join them, and which are purely habit (or in the case of 4sq, competitive). I, personally, was never confident of the etiquette, so generally avoided just dropping in at places where someone checked in.
I think Facebook is moving to prevent someone else getting any sort of a foothold in the social media space.
It's play essentially amounts to little more than "you don't need to look at FourSquare, you can just stay here with us". If it turns out to be popular great, if not then it's not fussed, but what Facebook doesn't want is someone else building up a user base with anything close to critical mass.
I mean, what problem does FarmVille solve?
Boredom. A lot of people are bored and wants to be entertained.
Companies like AngiesList and Groupon serve a broader market and are not based in SF area. So, they get less attention. But, these are bringing in far more revenue and will likely last longer.
Just because there's people that use Groupon-like utilitarian services doesn't mean that they won't have fun with other stuff too.
'build something people want' 'build something that solves a problem'
became just empty trivialities by now. These were important relevations after the dot com boom: During the first dot com boom there were those overly optimistic overly financed companies which did not care about what people want. But by now I think this lesson is learned, everybody want to solve a problem and everybody cares about what people want. It is just very hard to know what people want. Or at least hard to know it better then the competition. That's why most startups fail. Honestly I would not think some years ago that these services like Foursquare will be such a big deal. I am coming from a very different social context, so I cannot really understand the needs of those kind of people who use these services. That's why I don't even try to create these kind of startups.
"How do I avoid being bored?"
Seriously, an excess of leisure time may be another manifestation of business efficiencies brought about by technology improvements (the most obvious manifestation being unemployment). The long-term sociological implications could be interesting.
> So I said, narrow the focus. Your "use case" should be, there's a 22 year old college student living in the dorms. How will this software get him laid?
and consumers do get some extra deals from using these services
I think that makes sense and it's exactly what Foursquare and Gowalla do. Besides, if people only had invented what other people said their need was in history, perhaps we wouldn't have many things we take for granted today.
Also: Entertainment is a huge deal. Look at the gaming industry.
About 3 years ago a friend named Ed A. who owns a Ford Model-A took me out for a spin and it was surprisingly quick for it's very small engine, it wasn't the fastest of the mark but that didn't stop it from accelerating all the way to 100 km/h.
The difference between a steady 100 km/h and a horse is quite large, in fact we haven't gone much beyond what the Model-A could do in day to day driving situations.
They 'launched' it and it was a complete failure.
It was a unexpected failure - they thought it was going to be huge. But, the information they obtained from the failure was that the market changed. Their assumptions were incorrect. Instead of blaming it on a 'irrational customer', they "pivoted". They went out to research why and found out that customer segmentation had changed. Instead of based on economic customer segmentation ('low', 'middle income', ect.) there was a change towards a 'lifestyle' segmentation. They incorporated this new information into their development, and shortly after they successfully released the Ford Thunderbird - an American classic.
Great story.
It has the potential to facilitate the bond between person and place (business, shop, gym, bar, etc.) in a manner that is much more convenient than coupons, ticket coupons, remembering their faces and names, etc.
In this case, everyone wins.
I agree that this job is not important to everyone, some might buy it some might not, and to think about it further, I think their core priority is to give user enough motivation / incentives to use their LCB services, that's why they add Reward systems and gaming elements, in other words, give users more reasons to use their service rather than just mindlessly checking - ins, I wrote a blog post about this http://20sth.tumblr.com/post/974848197/how-to-get-users-to-u...
That said, I don't get Foursquare, etc. There isn't much entertainment there.
If you don't see a need or want to know where your friends are or, in Gowalla's case, what they are doing through pictures then you might need to rethink your friendship. Although it is cool to see what other people are up to that you might not know, these services are mainly tied to the close friends in your life, the people you care about and the people you want to spend the most amount of time with.
With that, I think that Facebook should concentrate on improving and designing a better core experience. Jumping on the mobile LBS isn't going to impress that many people. Plus the API is currently only read and although a rough time me table for write was given, Facebook has never been one to give out data all that freely.
Hmm, which bar in the neighborhood are my friends at tonight? Oh, I'll just check foursquare instead of texting them.
Many businesses at situated at a physical location, they need an effective way to be able to promote their offerings. People are out and about and want to know where the best places to go are, this combines their friends and other opinions, recommendations algorithms and can at time align with businesses wanting to promote themselves.
I guess saying this isn't a problem would be similar to saying that adwords didn't solve a problem for businesses less reliant on a physical location.
The catch is, however, that you need to have a significant amount of your friends and acquaintances using either service for them to become useful. Imagine if you were in college, and were meeting a bunch of new people every week, and you could see at any moment where your new friends are hanging out, or partying, or studying. You could see where the most popular hangouts are. You could check and see if anyone you know is at the same location you are currently at.
Once the network effect kicks in, these apps become awesome. And yes, just as people pigeonholed Twitter as being a narcissistic service, these apps allow people to express themselves as well, only through their choice of venue, not their choice of words.
If you want practical solutions, imagine a street team for a band or product going around town hitting all the hip locations spreading the word about a new album or product. They could keep tabs on each other as they fan out over the city and make sure they don't double up on locations.
The possibilities are endless, really. You just need to use your imagination and stop being so skeptical.
"721 people are gathering five blocks down? One of them posted a picture. Oh, looks like there is a free concert happening in the park? Let me check that out."
"355 people at grocery store? Maybe I'll wait until it slows down and go later."
"467 people on Interstate X? Might be an accident."
Even with anonymous tracking, this could be really interesting.