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The New Foursquare

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Re: The New Foursquare

#51

Post by bigdubs »

ssmoot wrote: post #20
misiti3780 wrote: post #17

I 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?

Swarm also is where the social components reside; seeing where your friends have checked in, seeing who's nearby, making plans etc.

Re: The New Foursquare

#52

Post by martingordon »

Foursquare, without ratings, serves a different use case than Yelp. I use Yelp to find a place to go. Once I'm there, I (sometimes, but not usually) check Foursquare for menu recommendations.

If I'm going out with friends, I don't want to put too much weight on my own tastes, I want to pick a place that has a high likelihood of appealing to everyone. Ratings are a good proxy for that – I don't have the time or the knowledge to filter tips by my friends' preferences.

Does the new Foursquare solve this? If not, then it can't compete with Yelp. If it does, was it worth the cost of losing future check-in data (due to less than 100% adoption of Swarm)?

As an aside, how are users' check-ins being used to inform recommendations? I would argue that they shouldn't – I've never heard of anyone just checking in on Foursquare to places they like, I think most people use Foursquare as a personal record and as a way to let friends know where they've been.

Re: The New Foursquare

#53

Post by caniszczyk »

doff wrote: post #7
acquiHire2014 wrote: post #2

They'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…

Agreed. I've been a super user for years, and I was happy to give foursquare all of my data because they did two great things with it: 1) they gave it back to me so I had an accessible record of my check-ins which is very helpful if you travel frequently, and very lovely if, like me, your personality combines deep nostalgia with shocking forgetfulness. It also made Timehop worth opening. 2) they used it in seemingly…

Honestly, I used the app the same way you did... I'm a bit dismayed with the new direction. It seems like they could have still left the checkin feature but made it less prominent (I still would have been happy as a super user)

Re: The New Foursquare

#54

Post by rdl »

I got really fed up with the forced move to Swarm a while ago, because I only really care about two parts of Foursquare -- a log of my own checkins, and tips at places once I've already arrived. I generally use Yelp or Google for discovering-new-venues, e.g. "search, nearby, chinese restaurant".

I ended up deleting both apps; I'll give it a try again in a few weeks to see if the integration got better, but it felt like I was really being forced into a (for me) worse experience. The Swarm app would lock up or otherwise be unresponsive.

Re: The New Foursquare

#55

Post by jvm »

rdl wrote: post #54

I got really fed up with the forced move to Swarm a while ago, because I only really care about two parts of Foursquare -- a log of my own checkins, and tips at places once I've already arrived. I generally use Yelp or Google for discovering-new-venues, e.g. "search, nearby, chinese restaurant". I ended up deleting both apps; I'll give it a try again in a few weeks to see if the integration got better, but it felt li…

> search, nearby, chinese restaurant

Have you tried using 4sq for this? I actually find it's quite good at it, and honestly the filters and interface are way nicer than Yelp.

Re: The New Foursquare

#56

Post by jvm »

martingordon wrote: post #52

Foursquare, without ratings, serves a different use case than Yelp. I use Yelp to find a place to go. Once I'm there, I (sometimes, but not usually) check Foursquare for menu recommendations. If I'm going out with friends, I don't want to put too much weight on my own tastes, I want to pick a place that has a high likelihood of appealing to everyone. Ratings are a good proxy for that – I don't have the time or the kn…

4sq does have ratings, and I actually find them to be pretty solid. I've never been disappointed by a place that was 9+.

Re: The New Foursquare

#57

Post by tibu »

schainan wrote: post #32
acquiHire2014 wrote: post #2

They'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 work for Foursquare; here's my answer to #3: It's not just that tips are shorter than reviews, though that's part of it. The issue with Yelp is that every single user gets the same recommendations if they search at the same place and time. And in a world where everything is becoming more personalized, it's crazy that the predominant app in the local search category does nothing to tailor its results to you. When yo…

Are you sure about the 90%? I've been a hardcore user and I don't use it since Swarm. And most of my friends don't use it anymore. People will slowly get out of it, tips will be ages old and somethings else will take over the place. I'm just sad that I put so much energy to get new places onto the map and write tips and you just make them fade away...

Re: The New Foursquare

#58

Post by teh_klev »

Can anyone explain the point of Foursquare? I live in rural Scotland, I ended up muting or ignoring friends who did this "I've just checked in " through Foursqaure. It just got really annoying, I don't really care about where my pals are "checking in to". Please enlighten me.

Re: The New Foursquare

#59

Post by zeitg3ist »

ToastyMallows wrote: post #3
acquiHire2014 wrote: post #2

They'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 completely agree with all points. I used to check-in every time I went somewhere, but now without the mayorship, badges, etc., I don't do anything anymore. I actually haven't opened Foursquare in about a week now. Not sure why they were so excited about losing functionality and fragmenting their user base.

The latest updates to Swarm reintroduced a few of the original gamification concepts, most notably an unlockable "mayor" sticker. Give it a try.

Re: The New Foursquare

#60

Post by abakker »

mbesto wrote: post #50
TarpitCarnivore wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My biggest complaint about Yelp is the same as yours, nearly everyone is a "foodie" and trying to write reviews like they're part of the New York Times.

The beauty of Yelp is that you don't have to read them! The power is in the fact that reviews are aggregated ("..and the fish is amazing!") and that you can search within them. Sometimes I wanna search "oysters" to see if their oysters are any good. Let's say out of 100 reviews one mentions oysters - at least now I have an idea what to expect about oysters, whereas in Foursquare this may not have even been documented…

Except that that aggregated data frequently aggregate useless info into a very reductive score. If I go to a $ restaurant, I don't value a poor review which bases itself on poor service. If I'm paying $10 a plate, I can handle almost any level of service if the food is good.

It's a sliding scale though, at $$$$ I would rate the service related review more highly.

I would LOVE if yelp let people rate reviews, as well as restaurants. Useful reviews deserver more weight than ones that say, "I hated it, and didn't leave a tip because the waiter was ..."

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