Foursquare Raises $35M More, Says It Has 45M Registered Users | Hacker News Reader

Foursquare Raises $35M More, Says It Has 45M Registered Users

techcrunch.com

31 pointsjayzee40 comments

Foursquare has served different purposes to-me over its evolution. Initially it was fun for the gamification aspect. I used it more than any other time. That eventually grew old, along with the privacy sacrificed in exchange for negligible returned value. Then, I used it to receive sponsored discounts. This was only an occasional use-case, but if you shopped at a store, and had your AMEX synced with Foursquare, you got a discount. AMEX seemed to take that concept over and now provides discounts for using your cards without needing to check-in, so that use-case disappeared. Now - I use it extremely rarely as a substitute for what something like Yelp does. I no-longer check-in, and rarely use the app. Some of my friends still religiously check-in ... and I guess it's neat to see those popup ... but I'm not sure how they monetize their 45 million registered users if their usage trend resembles anything similar to my own.

There is a reason behind them not mentioning the amount of active users.

A couple hundred thousand, maybe.

Surprised to see that it has now raised a total of $106 million.

http://www.crunchbase.com/company/foursquare

They've been around for almost 5 years now, so it's not too surprising. Not like they're a brand new startup.

They're also into mining some of the "data exhaust". Monetizing this turns them into something much bigger than a social checkin company.

Here's a presentation given at Data Driven New York. http://vimeo.com/79911529

> They're also into mining some of the "data exhaust". Monetizing this turns them into something much bigger than a social checkin company.

Location data changes very quickly: new places open and close, popularity waxes and wanes, and demographics of neighborhoods change unpredictably. Foursquare's location data is only as good as its freshness, so without a large pool of active users, there is no "data exhaust".

This is and, not or.

But it did sound like check in growth was tapering.

Something about this presentation really bugged me. From an engineering standpoint I thought it was pretty cool but as someone who really enjoys trying out random things and discovering things (thats are new to me) I would never use something like their suggestion product.

The surprising part is — who uses it? Why is it relevant? It feels like they're dragging a fad out a little too long waiting for google to buy them (again) and then immediately close it (again).

Some people really like it. I've talked to people who enjoy using it. It's not my cup of tea, but they definitely have an active user base.

It seems to me that investors keep pouring money into the business in order to try to keep the option to sell it at (capital contribution) break-even alive. The previous round was a +$40m debt facility, and debt, when you haven't got cash flow, ain't cheap (PIK, warrants @ down round valuation, dilution, etc.). I hope the best for the company, but sometimes I wished SecondMarket, SharesPost, et al allowed one to short startups.

Totally true about debt, however, in this market, with quantitative easing, current interest rates, etc. and with the right connections to people in finance, you can leverage a company for a lot less now than any time I can remember. Getting a loan is the hard part. If you can get one, you're getting it for pennies on the dollar.

> you're getting it for pennies on the dollar

What are you talking about? Foursquare ain't getting anything for free, if anything that debt is now over $50m at a very conservative 15% Kd assumption.

Can I ask why?

Slightly frustrated Foresquare user here. I'm a little confused about its usage and was wondering if some of the more avid users here could clarify a few things for me.

When I go to a restaurant, I have 3 separate actions that occur at 3 different times during my meal: 1 - Upon entering a restaurant, I want to "check in". 2 - When I get my meal, and it looks great, I want to post a photo. 3 - When I'm done eating, I want to leave a rating and a comment.

It seems that Foresquare's check-in is a one-time only action. I can't "update" my checkin in its various stages.

I don't use it as a social app as it's intended (since none of my friends use it here in Sydney). I use it as a tool to discover and rate restaurants.

You can update your check-in. If you simply check-in to the same location (but with a photo, comment, etc), it will automatically merge with and update your previous checkin.

Can 4sq help track where taxis are? Or even just friends or people on their way to meet you? That'd be killer. Combine that with cryptocoin payments and you'd have something that could compete with Uber or some taxi apps.

Would be good if it could predict meeting times.. how long for A,B,C to meet with D according to certain parameters (time of day, mode of transport)? .. C has lowest travel time. How long for A to get from point 1 to point 2? What's the probability of A being close to point 3 in the next week according to prior travel? How close? When is best time to go from A to B this week?

Also tracking fleets of cars/trucks.. create logistics apps, track travel times, optimal routes.

try an app called Twist

Anyone know if they have made any real money yet?

Note - From this deck[1] it looks like their "mobile mass market mom" (female 25-54) could potentially be the breadwinner. I desperately want to start a company that serves this market - loads of disposable income, time, and actively social.

[1]-http://www.businessinsider.com/leaked-pitch-deck-reveals-exa...

They're starting to make moves to. They recently overhauled the app to make it a lot less fun and social, and it has more ads now and the focus seems to have changed form fun to a yelp alternative, as others have pointed out.

hooray! So happy to see them make it this far, great job guys! Every iteration has been getting better and better.

any clue how many active users monthly?

I've literally never heard of foursquare in real life. Nobody I know uses it or has used it.

Do you live in an urban area? Foursquare has been commonly talked about by the non-tech-savvy people I know for years now. I'd actually say moreso than any social service other than Twitter and Facebook, over the past 3-4 years.

I don't know many people who check in, but if they do, they do it on facebook or instagram or twitter. The people I'm referring to our college kids or people living in SF or LA.

I live in downtown Toronto. I really don't know anyone who uses it.

I'm a 20 year old attending college in NYC. FourSquare is considered a running joke, like LinkedIn.

When you graduate, there's a possibility that LinkedIn may not still be considered a joke, for better or worse.

wait until you get out of college, and start looking for a job, LinkedIn will have the last laugh.

I'm 27 and killed my LinkedIn account because 1) I just don't find them to be a company that is concerned with user privacy and 2) I have not once seen a benefit to being on it.

I think it probably depends on your industry. I'm a programmer, so maybe if you're a finance major it's more useful.

I live in Portland, OR and don't know a single person that uses it.

I think my wife uses Foursquare out of a something like digital nostalgia, b/c she and all her friends were in their 20s in NYC when it was cool.

I use it almost daily, as well. I check in to places because it syncs with TimeHop and keeps a record of places I've been, which is useful to me. And the explore function is much better at finding places that I'll actually enjoy when I'm in neighborhoods and cities that I'm not usually in.

One of the most useful apps on my phone, honestly.

Remember BrightKite? Same category.

OK. I use it every day, as do a handful of my friends. I have a few other friends who only use it when they want to be sure everyone knows they're on a beach.

So, I mean, it does get used by regular people.

I don't either, but perhaps I'm too old (30). I imagine it's mostly used by people who spend far too much time on Twitter and FB and feel the need to be the center of their own little social black hole.

Everyone I know uses yelp.

Been using it for years with no intention of stopping. Me and my friends use it as a way to track all the places we've been to and places we like. So when I'm back in a city I've been to I can look at my history and recall a place I liked and go to it again. Or if someone is going to a place I've traveled to, I create a list of the places I liked and share it with them. I wish it was easier to do these use cases in the app. Mining my own history and surfacing that content would be very interesting and useful to me, especially if I can share it and have others shared with me. The tips are also far more helpful to me than the foodie-wannabe Yelp reviews for the same venues.

Totally agree. It's really helpful, and rewards continued usage.

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