Facebook Find Friends Nearby

https://m.facebook.com/friendshake

by pdufour • 14 years ago

51 28 14 years ago

m.facebook.com

Nice. I similarly built streetbooking.com (which I think is broken because of some api changes) for the same reason. This sort of thing comes in handy when you meet people for the first time with common names. Good luck finding them through the native people search.

peter_l_downs2• 14 years ago

For finding people who aren't nearby, I recently built Who Will I Know There [1]. Using facebook's search tools to filter friends by location was a huge pain in the ass; this is better.

[1] http://wwikt-peterldowns.dotcloud.com/

kmfrk2• 14 years ago

This is a really great project. You should totally promote that as much as possible.

It may be one of my extensions blocking it, but it should be more clear that this uses Facebook. If they allow, maybe include a Facebook "F" in the submit button.

peter_l_downs2• 14 years ago

Thanks for the feedback! Glad someone liked it :) You're right that it should be more clear that this depends on Facebook — I'll take a look at that.

joshaidan• 14 years ago

Is this something Facebook made, or a user created app?

kjhughes• 14 years ago

Ryan Patterson, an engineer at Facebook, "built Find Friends Nearby with another engineer for a hackathon project." See his comment on the Techcrunch article on it:

http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/24/friendshake-facebooks-new-m...

starship• 14 years ago

Uh-oh, lookout, it's a Highlight killer! Just like how facebook killed foursquare (fb check-ins), quora (fb questions), Craigslist (fb marketplace), and whatever it is they were trying to kill with fb credits, now they're coming for Highlight.

Might as well give up now, Highlight. You're doomed.

thatusertwo• 14 years ago

Does Highlight require a Facebook account?

allardschip2• 14 years ago

It does...

Sami_Lehtinen• 14 years ago

I personally think that it really sucks to post links that require registration. It's just like those links "free what ever" and then they ask for tons of personal details. No, it isn't free at all. This is something I have commented several times in LinkedIn. It's promotion & data-grabbing, it isn't public or free. So in this case, I would give -10 points to this link.

Eh, it's actually just like free stuff they mail you, you only pay $29 for handing and posting costs.

Here is an article about that feature that you can read without registration: http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/24/friendshake-facebooks-new-m...

CWIZO3• 14 years ago

Great, another way for FB to show people I don't know down my throat.

I really don't get it. What does FB have to gain from me friending a million users? I thought the point is to build meaningful connections with people I actually know. But the way they are handling things is just stupid. The "people you may know" widget on their page (web&mobile) has never ever suggested a person I actually knew. Just some random friends of my friends that I've just friended, or sometimes not even that. Can anybody shed some light on this?

retube• 14 years ago

the more poeple you're friends with the wider the audience for the sponsored stories/news thing

CWIZO3• 14 years ago

But that becomes useless if I'm friends with people I don't know!

milesokeefe• 14 years ago

I think they cater to both types. They want to make existing social connections stronger but they also want to create them.

I think it makes a lot of sense for Facebook to implement a feature which lets you friend people physically near you. There have been people I have never talked to but simply seen around who I found on Facebook and became friends with in real life, but otherwise wouldn't have without Facebook.

This form of social interaction may not interface well with yours, but it doubtless does for others. Given that Facebook's business model is to appeal to as many people as possible, and features like this don't cause any notable quantity of people to discontinue using the service, it makes sense.

CWIZO3• 14 years ago

Maybe this feature isn't obtrusive, which is nice. But having a random stranger on-top of my news feed every time I open FB on my phone is getting really really old (people you may know).

derrida3• 14 years ago

So happy I quit, now I don't feel like my life is under surveillance. They are a surveillance company.

dag112• 14 years ago

Uhh, did you read the page? It says:

  People who appear above are nearby and have this page open.

This isn't a constant list of whoever is nearby. It's a list of nearby users who have this page open. It's intended for two people to be able to easily friend each other when out in public. They just take out their phones, go to this page, and click on the user.

derrida3• 14 years ago

I was talking about Facebook. Have they stopped allowing people to post pictures of me without my consent?

kmfrk2• 14 years ago

Hate to be that guy, but can someone mirror or copy-pasta the post to people without a Facebook account?

middus• 14 years ago

Screenshot would do, too.

It would be nice if not only paywalled but also login-only resources were frowned upon on HN.

Albuca• 14 years ago

I agree. Plus there are people who are browsing HN from behind a corperate firewall that blocks Facebook, are stuck in the dark as well.

Edit: Sami_Lehtinen posted the link lower down!

relix• 14 years ago

What would you suggest? A screenshot of the resource would be even less accessible for the majority because like it or not, I'm sure 90% of HN users do use Facebook.

This is a major feature that deserves a place on HN frontpage (especially compared to some other recent posts) and shouldn't be ignored just because it's behind a login screen.

allardschip2• 14 years ago

Facebook has taken their app offline: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/06/facebook-quietly-rele...

In the mean time, a company called FriendThem announced they are contemplating legal action against Facebook because they feel their idea was stolen: http://venturebeat.com/2012/06/25/friendthem-sues-facebook-c...

Which made me think this idea is too simple to sue each other over. I wrote a clone in about half a day yesterday (the link above). For those interested in the technology, it's made with Python, Bottle.py, Gevent, MongoDB, CoffeeScript and JQuery Mobile. Code is here: https://github.com/allards/connectnearby

A live version is here http://connect.othercircles.com

The app would be much more useful if you could connect on Linkedin, Twitter or with a vcard as well. NFC would be perfect for this. What do you think?

Facebook Find Friends Nearby

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