With Foursquare I used to make pretty interesting friends by friending people at the same venue. I had a lot of fun following and meeting and commenting with a fashion teacher who bounces between NYC and Korea, a NJ man stuck going to the hospital regularly, etc.. With Swarm that has been completely removed and you only see people you know and only half the people I knew even transferred over to the new app. I don't even know what Foursquare is for any more, an attempted Yelp clone, I guess, but I just use Yelp for that instead because it is better.
The New Foursquare
11–20 of 77 posts
Re: The New Foursquare
#12They've sacrificed their core of users who supplied all of the checkins and tips in order to try to kill Yelp. Problem was, only those loyal users were ever convinced that they were better than yelp. Now that they've chosen the foursquare name, which is synonymous with checkins, for their Yelp clone, it seems like they haven't thought out... 1. If the checkin users leave because Swarm is stupid and eliminates everyth…
Exactly! The transition was also handled poorly. How annoying was it to have an unfamiliar Swarm pop-up anytime you wanted to check-in on Foursquare? How annoying is it that all your badges are gone? These new stickers seem cool, how do I earn them?
I mean, I love the new spontaneous event planning feature, sure. But really, all Swarm did was add a tab and some stickers. I honestly feel as if a simple redesign including those two features would have sufficed. Instead, they made a huge gamble based on data and didn't really think about how the current users would adapt.
Re: The New Foursquare
#13They've sacrificed their core of users who supplied all of the checkins and tips in order to try to kill Yelp. Problem was, only those loyal users were ever convinced that they were better than yelp. Now that they've chosen the foursquare name, which is synonymous with checkins, for their Yelp clone, it seems like they haven't thought out... 1. If the checkin users leave because Swarm is stupid and eliminates everyth…
I've stopped using 4sq when they forced to check in through Swarm.
Swarm was constantly monitoring me and eating the battery. At least in Foursquare app you could turn of the 'Radar'.
Good bye 4sq.
Re: The New Foursquare
#14I'm using Foursquare mainly to make new friends and find interesting people/places. They just made that more difficult. Would have loved if they increased the friends number limit, and made it easier to communicate with other members.
Won't remove my account but will stop using it. I wonder how their performance will move in the next few weeks. It'll be devastating if their user-base is using it for the same reason (as me) and just stop checkin-ing.
Re: The New Foursquare
#15They've sacrificed their core of users who supplied all of the checkins and tips in order to try to kill Yelp. Problem was, only those loyal users were ever convinced that they were better than yelp. Now that they've chosen the foursquare name, which is synonymous with checkins, for their Yelp clone, it seems like they haven't thought out... 1. If the checkin users leave because Swarm is stupid and eliminates everyth…
I recall seeing a data presentation on 4square a few months ago, and the numbers suggested that check-ins were tapering. They definitely realized that all their corporate value was in the data.
Perhaps they are trying to avoid the split issues from Netflix? I think they needed to give the Foursquare name to the Yelp-killer so that people would know about it. The space is too crowded to start from scratch. And Yelp is ready to be killed.
Re: The New Foursquare
#16They've sacrificed their core of users who supplied all of the checkins and tips in order to try to kill Yelp. Problem was, only those loyal users were ever convinced that they were better than yelp. Now that they've chosen the foursquare name, which is synonymous with checkins, for their Yelp clone, it seems like they haven't thought out... 1. If the checkin users leave because Swarm is stupid and eliminates everyth…
I've stopped using 4sq when they forced to check in through Swarm. Swarm was constantly monitoring me and eating the battery. At least in Foursquare app you could turn of the 'Radar'. Good bye 4sq.
You can turn off the tracking in Swarm as well.
Re: The New Foursquare
#17I have been using Foursqaure for years in NYC, and I think it is really useful for finding new places and picking food on the menus. Checkins, at the end of the day, are a means to an end. Mayorships/Badges/Game Mechanics/etc. might have made their app more viral (I stress might), but it appears there was never going be a way to monetize them, hence their "pivot"
This is how I see it now:
1) If you still live in a major metropolitan area (like NYC, San Fran) then the service is still useful (probably more useful with this new design)
2) If you do not live in a major metropolitan area, Foursqaure is pretty much useless - but it always was and always will be.
3) Now that they removed checkins, I dont expect to ever get recommendations better than what I am currently getting, because I am not downloading swarm.
The fact that they removed checkins from their core app seems really crazy to me - not because I thought checking in were useful, but more because the whole concept around the new app (I think?) is their machine learning algorithms leverage their huge database to provide great recommendations. With Swarm, not only did they add friction to creating more of this data easily (I have to switch apps to do it), Swarm was actually pretty buggy and doesnt appear to be gaining user adoption (per app store reviews, which are obviously subjective).
Disclaimer: I rarely use Yelp, and never use it in NYC because of Foursqaure
Re: The New Foursquare
#18I don't buy the privacy argument. Its an inherently extroverted market so you split your apps into an introvert app that no one in the market will want to use and an extrovert app. Why?
I don't buy the assertion that the small segment of the population that was into 4sq would be into privacy. They're optimizing the experience for people that don't exist beyond the initial fad-explosion.
I would extend my remarks that its a two phase operation where the initial phase is all friends and family and social, but it rapidly converts to astroturfing, basically geo-aware semi-stealthy advertising. Its twitter, as a self selected spam delivery service, but location aware. Not sure how that fits into the privacy angle. This is going to be missed insight on HN because there are so many early adopters here who will remember nostalgically the good old days of being the first on a new service before the masses and then astroturfers invaded and destroyed it.
Re: The New Foursquare
#19Wow, coordinated assaults from two of their larger backers (USV and AH). Please, please Marissa Mayer take us out of this bad trade.
Yes, and the article reads like an advertisement. I generally like reading AVC posts because there's often some thought-provoking questions or other insight with broader application. Not so on this one. I guess the take-away point with this one is going to be long-term, watching to see if they're successful in using empty buzz to generate an exit.
Re: The New Foursquare
#20I have been using Foursqaure for years in NYC, and I think it is really useful for finding new places and picking food on the menus. Checkins, at the end of the day, are a means to an end. Mayorships/Badges/Game Mechanics/etc. might have made their app more viral (I stress might), but it appears there was never going be a way to monetize them, hence their "pivot" This is how I see it now: 1) If you still live in a ma…
Piggy-backing: They want reviews and tips right? I rarely check-in on Yelp, but on the rare occasion I do, I'm probably also writing a review and uploading photos.
Why on earth would you make a whole separate app for a single button and modal? And what incentive do I have to participate?