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Foursquare now available in the Windows Store

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As of today, Foursquare is available in the Windows Store.  Beautiful, fast and fluid – this app is full of photos and information about great places right around you, and reveals a new way to discover businesses and attractions near and far.  Foursquare has been available on Windows Phone for quite a while, but landing on Windows 8 represents an exclusive Foursquare tablet experience on any platform.  When I load up the app I’m reminded of a well-bound coffee table book, and that immersive design helps me to get a feel for what these places are really like. This app makes the most of the UX on Windows, drawing in the user with a stunning way to navigate more than 55 million points of interest.  The Windows Experience blog talks more about the consumer experience.
 
  
 
Let’s talk about this in the context of developers though.  From a development standpoint, Foursquare was able to tailor an experience for a larger screen by taking advantage of their rich data sets.  The larger landscape of a Windows tablet lends itself nicely to beautiful and immersive applications that encourage a user to deeply engage with the content.  Further, Foursquare was able to use skills native to their organization by developing this Windows 8 application fully in HTML5 and JavaScript.  All said, it was pretty straightforward to use existing skills and rich content to great a great Windows 8 app.

So beyond being beautiful on the outside, it’s the inside that is even more interesting.  The database powering it includes user tips and pictures from 35 million users, creating unique location information built on a social network. Whatever time of day you search, Foursquare is going to offer local search results based on a database that’s tailored to what’s popular, when you’re searching. If in the morning you search for somewhere to eat the results are going to show you what’s popular there and then – you’ll see coffee shops and diners, not steakhouses.  Results are also tailored to where you and your friends go, and what you do.   Of course, as a big sports fan, I pulled up our stadium here, and right away, it shows me great pictures including the Sounders game three nights ago where we took down the Portland Timbers.
 
 

With user tips and pictures pulled in from people around the world, there is powerful data behind this app.  Together with Windows 8, Foursquare paints a beautiful canvas of the places around you.  We’re all really excited about the launch of Foursquare on Windows tablets and can’t wait to see what you think of it!

Comments

  • Anonymous
    August 27, 2013
    Awesome design! Here is the link: apps.microsoft.com/.../3b4b8be2-f224-4827-9449-019739d9c4c8

  • Anonymous
    August 28, 2013
    Great design, Can you give some insight on your choice of HTML5/JS over/or not Xaml/C#?  Developer resources? Thanks

  • Anonymous
    September 03, 2013
    Thanks Marlon Foursquares’ domain expertise is with HTML and Javascript. By writing the application using WinJS over XAML/C# , the development team at Foursquare was able to make the most of the skills they already had.