Yet another Google Labs idea that popped into my head. As a person in my mid-twenties…ok LATE twenties, I’m looking for fun weekend activities that involve others my age. Sometimes events pop up that seem enticing such as farmers markets, concerts, charity events, sporting events. While I often go despite the turnout, wouldn’t it be nice to know where fun and hip things are going on and if they are drawing a crowd? This is where Google comes in. We all know that our android phones are walking GPSs, and while we hate to give away too much information about where we are at any given time, I think that if we did so anonymously it might just work. ( Some people already “check in” to where they are on Facebook, giving away their identity, so this idea isn’t even as intrusive as that one).
Follow the mob would be a Google site that you elect into, where through being signed into your gchat or Gmail on your phone, Google will project your image as a red dot at an event. The idea is that if you find a cool thing to do on the weekend and the attendance could be better, or if you just want people to know where you are, you can allow yourself to be “part of the mob.” Many red dots with people your age at a place will show up as a “hot spot” on a Google Map online. Again, this is a tool for regional use. I believe that many of these online tools should be broken down by region, but the idea is that you can track online clumps of red dots and see where large groups of people are. This could also be useful for single people trying to find a date, especially if Google can customize it by demographics such as age and gender.
I remember living in Arlington VA, and going to the Harris Teeter grocery store on Sunday afternoons and thinking I was in a bar in Georgetown on a Saturday night. I even got a phone number once! It just so happened that THAT grocery store at THAT time was teeming with people my age. This is the type of information Follow the Mob could help with.
Tags: Android, events, Google Labs, new ideas, tracking
There is an app called Grinder which is kind of like what you are talking about mixed with a match.com type concept. It is for gay males and pretty much every gay friend I have uses it. Seeing how successful that is, I don’t doubt something like what you are talking about would be successful as well.
“Grinder” for a dating site just sounds too raunchy to me. That being said, I’m glad that something like that already exists!