Foursquare recently announced that it would be splitting its offerings in two, moving all of the original app’s social features to a new app, Swarm, while leaving venue-finding features in the standard FourSquare app. The app, which was just released, is incredibly simple in functionality. But its simplicity and intelligent new features are what might make it the first truly successful friend-finding app–and its friendly bee logo might help a bit as well.
Apple’s “Find My Friends” launched more than two years ago and, while it hasn’t been a complete failure, most people find the service creepy and just plain unnecessary. But services like this could very well become commonplace in the near future, and Foursquare’s hopes to reduce creepiness and increase usability. And part of increasing usability for any app is reducing this concept to what’s absolutely necessary; the simplicity of Swarm is a great example of this.
The app lets you check in manually, as was the case with the Foursquare app, but it also tracks your location in the background with your consent. The app uses push notifications to let you know when friends are nearby, allowing you to have last-minute meetups. At the home screen of the app you’ll find a list of all the people using the app that are within a short walk of you.
Secondly, the app’s third tab (seen as the screenshot on the left above) lets you write statuses about your upcoming and current plans. It’s a mini bulletin board of sorts that lets you quickly ask if there are any friends nearby that want to meetup; this is a great way to make future plans.
And that’s it. Foursquare’s move to two apps is obviously an attempt to grab the location-based social network space with the launch of a new product, and by the looks of it, Swarm is pretty great. The potential for this app to join the ranks among Vine, Instagram, and other cultural hits is obvious, but that will depend on how well the app does at the beginning.
You can get the app right now on the App Store for free.
How do you feel about Foursquare splitting in two? Are you ready to embrace location sharing social networks like Swarm?
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