I have been defending my use of Foursquare for years, at this point.
People are constantly still asking me why I use the service, followed by questions or comments like, Why do you want people to know where you are? or Who care about becoming the mayor? It’s so arrogant. blah blah blah.
Neither of these things really matter to me and I generally give some kind of answer about data. I have been a journaler for most of my life – whether is was a diary, live journal, to-do lists, Moleskins, twitter, etc. and the thing that most intrigues me about platforms that can collect behavior is obviously, the historical data. New music platforms have come and gone over the years, but I refuse to switch from Last.fm, despite the company’s total lack of innovation, post-CBS purchase, because I have years of historical data invested into that platform, which has an open API.
The main reason (there are others) that I use Foursquare is to have the historical check-in data, which is something that I find far more interesting than becoming the mayor of the Brooklyn Bridge (although, that would rule). When people engage me in this debate, I usually tell them that open source culture allows amazing new platforms to be built upon the work of others every day, and that I know SOME DAY there will be other platforms that use the Foursquare API (for something awesome) and I will be glad to have the backlog of data.
Well, my friends, that day has arrived, and I know that this is only the first of many that I will truly love.
Meet Meshu:
Meshu is the brainchild of data visualization extraordinaire’s Sha Hwang and Rachel Binx. The concept is simple and genius, combining several things that I love: digital fabrication, maps, data and well designed, beautiful jewelry!
Your data + a 3D printer + a laser cutter = an original piece of jewelry ^-^
There are three ways to create on meshu: search for places, point to them on a map OR use foursquare connect to pull in all of your data.
Obviously, I had to see what would happen if I used I used Foursquare Connect. Look at all of the crazy combos!
I can easily see how my Friday night is going to be spent :)
Oh, and if you need more reasons to try and understand why people use Foursquare or other geolocation based services, read Marshall Kirkpatrick’s article of Why We Check-In (I clear fall under the “As a Personal History” Bucket) on ReadWriteWeb.
THANKS TO JOJO FOR SENDING ME MESHU!!! <3 <3 ^-^ <3 <3
Nice post Lauren! Not just with explaining to others, sometimes I find myself grappling with the reason on why I use Foursquare myself too. I enjoy Foursquare for the same reason but haven’t been using it as much these days because I find that It doesn’t record and present historical data in a good way. It’s an okay tool to discover things around you but the downside is that interaction is fairly limited, and it doesn’t make sense of the data for you (even if its just something simple like visualizing the data like meshu). That I find, defeats the purpose of using it as a journal over a long period of time.
What do you think?
Yo, Tre!
I am constantly grappling with why I do anything with technology :)
I totally agree that 4sq totally underutilizes the historical data aspect of their service. I hope fixing this is in their product roadmap, as more people start to amass a history.
Right now, for me, 4sq is mostly just a data collecting tool (not even a journal); I don’t really use any of the other functionality. There are of course acceptions, like when I go to a conference and want to see who is there, or when I serendipitously meet up with someone at the airport because we are both killing time.
I find the discovery mechanisms to be weak, because they don’t take into account any of my affinity profile. Although, I’ve used it on more than one occasion to find something that I went to once but can’t find it again.
So, I agree about the lack of cool, data driven things that they are doing, which is why I am looking to 3rd parties to innovate around the behaviors that the service instigates. Too give 4sq some credit, I believe that this is why they have an open API, to encourage others to take the service in new directions :)
ps I am still waiting for someone to create an über digital journal, so that I can plug all of my data streams into and it will dynamically create a journal of all of my historical behavior, so I can start to see my own patterns between all of these ridic services that I use!
Haha I totally feel you, there’s only so many badges and check-ins one can have before they are bored. Well they have introduced more features (explore) to work around the discovery and serendipity but you’re right that they are pretty disappointing so far. For me Foursquare works great as a check-in and locations service, and for keeping track of your history but I feel that there’s a gap in making that data more personalized and useful towards just you. I struggle to find more than 10 friends in my network that uses Foursquare on a consistent basis. But then maybe it doesn’t matter what I think since they raised funding at $600M valuation.
I have been thinking around the space of a digital journal too, in that aspect what are your thoughts on Path?
Seems like the SoLoMo trend is gaining more traction and a lot of companies are placing big bets on it. Have you tried other apps that are attempting to engineer serendipity like Glancee or Highlight?
oh
my
GOSH!
I’m so glad you like Meshu. And I totally MISSED the Foursquare integration the first time. Your U.S. shape looks like a big f’ing diamond. Yay yay! \(^-^)/
I love that Schaffhausen made this list! <3
oh
my
GOSH!
I’m so glad you like Meshu. And I totally MISSED the Foursquare integration the first time. Your U.S. shape looks like a big f’ing diamond. Yay yay \(^-^)/
Interesting! I met someone who was really into 3d printing and I had saw another website where they sell 3d products, such as rings, pins, etc… It’s pretty cool stuff! i guess I’m just not there yet! I also heard of another app where it tracks where you are throughout the day, even if you were in Walmart or Target, it’ll track that even if you don’t “check in” or even if you’re in your car, suggest routes for work when there are accidents…etc.. Have a great 4th of July!