After seeing Foursquare's success, Facebook decides to use Microsoft model, and create its own version of Foursquare to compete with Foursquare, and possibly knock out Foursquare eventually.
Never a big fan of Facebook (the idea of "self promoting and being a narcissism" conflicts with the teaching I thrived on as a child), never used Foursquare (always disqualify it before use it, because the description of Foursquare makes me feel if I don't have enough friends using it, it would be useless to me, like Google Latitude).
I do have a fair sense of what each does, and I am not trying to compare and declare a winner here. I just want to discuss about the issue brought up by this article.
As the conclusion of the article, the author implies Facebook clearly has the edge, due to its existing loyal following. Foursquare seems to be in trouble, and a nice descent innovator seems to undergo elimination due to inability to compete with legal "idea counterfeit" (again). Or is it?
First of all, is Foursquare truly threatened by Facebook Places?
"Maybe" is the best answer I can give, but I do think "not necessarily". Who are going to use this kind of service? Smartphone users. What does it mean for these people to use Foursquare? Click on Foursquare icon (wait for load) and start publishing to Twitter and Facebook friends. What does it mean for these people to use Facebook Places? Click on Facebook icon (wait for load) and click on Places icon (wait for load) and start publishing to Facebook friends (not sure whether Twitter friends can see them, although there is a good chance these two groups have a good size overlap).
This means, one more click and one more waiting time (for a generation with extremely short attention span), and possibly publishing to a smaller group of friends. The edge starts looking a little blurry. The practical example? On Android phones, Google separates features like Places and Latitude into separate apps. Pageonce creates a stand-alone app just for travel info, which was under its Assistance app's itinerary category originally. Twitter is not much different from Facebook status, besides the follow option.
Apparently, Facebook can also disintegrate its Places from Facebook, but not until then, Foursquare doesn't seem to be in trouble. (oh one more thing, Foursquare apparently support more platforms, and that is a big plus at this state).
Therefore, Facebook's path to consume Foursqure seems to be quite clear, make Facebook Places a one-click event, and support more platforms. Then what could Foursquare do to keep the competitive advantage?
That would be my second question.
The best feature-overlap but yet coexisting example is probably Twitter and Facebook. Twitter shifts its niche a little bit to create this "forever" living ground. What Foursquare could do? Simple options include 1) keep innovating and leave Facebook always one-step behind, 2) merge with a larger company, which has a significant user-base, like Google, and 3) make everything more intuitive. manageable and fun than the counterpart in Facebook Places.
For number 1), it is to imitate Twitter's "follow". Find something Facebook cannot do (possibly due to complication it brings to Facebook;s existing framework), or keep providing better and more features. Out-compete Facebook this way is to take advantage on Facebook's inability to focus on this one product.
For number 2), whatever.
For number 3), this is to imitate Apple's way to knock out Microsoft, in products like... pretty much everything. It is like saying "you want to out-compete me by imitating me with a larger resource? well, try harder". Better design, better user experience, making commonly used features more accessible, and possibly encouraging plug-ins. Maybe incorporating a scavenger hunt feature based on friends' rating or other users' rating on places in a town could be a nice start.
Anyway, either business's success is none of my business, and I just like to see better features as a result of competition.
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