Fatdoor is an upcoming social network that's all about location. Instead of creating your network of friends based on interests or real-life relationships, the creators of Fatdoor want you to use the service to get a better feel for your neighborhood and what's going on around you.
The system works by slurping in local business and residential listings, and placing them on a Microsoft Virtual Earth map. While the businesses get pinpoint-accuracy, residential listings are clumped together in a general area, until users decide to claim the house or building as their own. Each user gets their own profile where they can list their interests, both generally and with regard to things in and around the neighborhood.
One of the key uses of Fatdoor is interacting with local businesses. The service aggregates reviews of local establishments from several services, including Yelp, so you can browse through reviews and leave your own. Here's where things get a little tricky--users of these other sites won't be able to see your comments. In fact, only other Fatdoor users will be able to see your take. The system works a little bit like coComment, which Webware reviewed last month.
In addition to restaurant reviews, Fatdoor has built in its own services, like an events planner, local interest groups, and driving directions. Some of the services, like the local events listings, are aggregated from third-party services, but the rest are built in-house and fed by Fatdoor members.
To keep track of all this activity, Fatdoor's welcome page has a series of activity feeds on it, listing the most recent groups and events. It feels a little bit like Facebook, albeit a little less comprehensive. Users also get their own wall to put up notices, called "shout outs," which can double as discussion threads.
Short of block parties--and friendly knocks to tell people to turn down their subwoofers--it's definitely not easy to meet your neighbors. Fatdoor is a very ambitious service that's trying to solve that, albeit using the Internet. Creator Raj Abhyanker explained to me that he knows the barrier to entry is high, since users need to be real people with a real address, but he thinks they can gain a lot more out of a social network if it's local and "face to face." The service is still a couple of months from making its launch; look for it near the end of summer.
With Fatdoor you can see who your neighbors are and interact with them using several social networking tools.
(Credit: CNET Networks)
I'm here at O'Reilly's Where 2.0 conference here in San Jose, which is about to kick off. At last night's Launch Pad event, four new services launched.
Fatdoor made its official alpha launch. Originally slated for a release at last month's Web 2.0 Expo, the service opened its doors for people interested in testing the service on their way to making it publicly available. The service touts itself as being a "neighborhood-based community social network," and a place to find local people or events. We'll try to get a hands-on later this week.
Dopplr, like Fatdoor is a location-oriented social network. It's currently in private beta.
GeoCommons is a social map creation and exploration service. Users can browse and create maps filled with various data. Like Swivel (which launched their geomaps last night), there are all sorts of data sets that make a little more sense when you see them geographically instead of on a chart.
UpNext is a mix between an events service and Google Earth. Users can control a 3-D map, and see where events are visually. The service is currently in an invite-only beta.
The conference is about to kick off. Stay tuned.
Still barely three months old, Fatdoor can probably be forgiven for delaying its promised Web 2.0 Expo launch. Originally scheduled for an April 15 rollout, the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company says it will make its public debut on May 1 instead.
But Fatdoor had no qualms about setting up a booth in the Expo hall and answering--or not answering, as the case may be--questions about the social network and mapping service still in stealth mode.
Fatdoor CTO Chandu Thota, whose background is in mapping, claims the service is more Web 3.0 than 2.0, as in human computing plus user-generated content.
What we do know: Fatdoor's chairman is Bill Harris, former CEO of Intuit and Paypal. The service will be like social white pages--pre-seeded with information about people and where they're located at its launch. Its reach will be national, but the tag line is "get to know your neighbors." Groups and search will be based on political leanings, ethnicity and activities.
Stay tuned for more on Fatdoor when it launches.
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