Facebook has scrapped one of its services which might not have been used by many, but it was an attractive service of the social networking giant. Places has been removed from the Facebook services list. Places was deemed to be a clone service of Foursquare. Facebook’s confirmation meant that the feed of Places check-in would be removed from the interface and mobile apps. Places was used only by 6% of Facebook users since it was launched a year back.
Facebook Places had a promising start where it was being termed as the Loopt-beheader, the Gowalla-strangler, the Foursquare-killer, etc. However, Facebook has killed Places with a replacement called ‘Nearby’. This would double down its task, but the ‘check-in’ services have been out. This new feature would give the user an option to note the past, present and future of your location status. These three main ways view location usage as:
- Share where you’ve been
- Share where you are now
- Share where you’re going
This has not yet been nailed out by anyone. The benefit for a user would be that now they would get an option to use with their each and every action on Facebook. One can easily turn this option off too. This means that as a context layer, location will be upgraded. But Places was no real hit for Facebook as many did not know about it, whereas this automatic option would get in for many a users and this could get the service a number of users.
The detailing of this option was done by Facebook as below:
“Once someone tags where they are on Facebook, they will be directed to the News Feed. If the Place is offering a Check-in Deal, the title of the deal will appear below the News Feed story. You’ll then be able to click on the deal title and will then be taken to the claim flow.”
Image Source: www.wpcentral.com
Talking about Foursquare, the base inspiration for Places, it had a recent funding round and the money raised was $50 million which was based on the company’s value which totaled to $600 million. It takes Foursquare to a really good position in for its services. Rated as the best in the nation, they can now only move ahead and just better their services for check-in. With the mobile subscriber count of more than 5 billion all over the world, the number is now expected to grow further as a Foursquare spokesperson said that their 100% focus is on building an amazing product which would bring in a whole new world of experience for the users. He continued saying that this would be much more than what others in the same field do.
Mark Zuckerberg has always been in favor of extending the personal privacy boundaries by shooting first and then there would be the ask questions section. Facebook Places was competing with no biggie in its field, but it can still ring the bells for these giants such as Facebook and Google that competing with one another is not a bigger challenge that competing with the early movers in their field. Like Facebook, Google has even had to shed out many features where they were competing with the ‘early movers’.