Where Is Everybody?
Part 2
How To Find Where Your Friends Are
This is the second installment of a series reviewing location sharing apps. I’m going to continue reviewing and commenting on competitors to my current project, AnchorUp. If you’re interested in my motivation or additonal background information, please read the first article. There, you can also find a review of the location sharing in Apple’s Messages App.
Option 2: Share Location Find My Friends App
The Find My Friends is a very well designed app that integrates well with Apple Maps. The backbone of this app is the ability to connect to iCloud, which allows constant monitoring of your and your friends location. Here is a walkthrough of the user interface with commentary:
This is the first view you’re greeted with. Immediately I noticed the quality of design, and with only 3 buttons, simplicity.
I would have expected to have friends already because its almost a native app, but using iCloud contacts couldn’t be that difficult…
If you hit “Add” button in the main view, it takes you to this Invite Friends view. I was extremely confused as to why these two contacts were waiting to be added, as I have no idea who they are.
When I attempted to search for my roomates by name, I couldn’t find any of them. The search feature uses iCloud email contacts, and I couldnt find any friends that way. In order to get new friends, you have to send them invitations by email.
I Literally Couldn’t Find My Friends
So after I texted a few people for their email addresses, and commanded them friend me, I was able to see them on my map.
You can easily see where they are in relation to you, and their distance is displayed.
In order to view someone’s location, you have to let them see yours. The location is not instantaneous, but persistent
More Like “Follow My Friends”
I was a little creeped out by the fact that my friends could track me 24/7. It would be easy to forget about the app running and not know that they can always see where you are.
When you click on a contact, you’re given a few options, one of which is to “Notify Me”.
Here, as you can see, you can set the app up to notify you whenever they leave or arrive somewhere.
Lastly, much like the Messages App, you can see yourself in a full screen Apple Maps view and access all of its features.
Conclusions
Much like in the Messages App, sharing location in Find My Friends is elegant and easy to use. Perhaps, though, it is so easy because the app only requires you to interact with it once per friend, because they can see you (and you them) whenever you want. It certainly makes it convenient for certain relationships (for parents to see kids, bosses to see employees, ect.), but eerie for most social relationships.
Problems
Here are some problems I see with this feature that I hope to resolve in AnchorUp:
- It is very difficult to add contacts. You are limited to email and iCloud.
- Nobody uses it. Maybe because people don’t think they need this type of app or because apple doesn’t market it well.
- Persistent location sharing (following) is unnerving and uncomfortable. To be completely honest, its a reason to delete the app right away.
- The ability of your friends to be notified when you leave or arrive somewhere is a huge lapse in permission and privacy.
- There is no other way to communicate (you have to leave the app to send text/picture messages).
