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I totally agree. The best case scenario is to make a product that is useful for 1 user, but becomes even more useful as more and more users use it. The best example is FourSquare. You can check in, and earn badges, but as you tell more and more friends about it, those badges become a bigger status symbol. Yet even without any friends, it still feels good using it

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I also agree with the article but FourSquare seems to me more like a counterexample rather than the best example. Its utility is arguable even after the network effects, let alone without them.

Yes, Foursquare would be a "social" idea in my mind. However, Dennis Crowley has had an exit previously, so I think it makes social ideas easier for him to pursue. I think social ideas with network effects are very difficult to succeed with when you're a first time entrepreneur with no track record.

How is FourSquare doing nowadays? I never used it, but it was a big deal about a year ago and I haven't heard much from 'em since (I'd pretty much forgotten about them).

With competition from facebook checkins, isn't FourSquare more or less doomed right now?

I just did a quick analysis with Google Insights for Search and posted the results. To me, it looks like 4sq is flat since April globally, and down 30% from its peak in Aug 2010 in the US:

http://yak.to/tech/p.bf/Has-Foursquare-peaked

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