Wednesday, July 9. 2008

Why Fire Eagle hasn't convinced Rory of the wonders of LBS

Rory Cellan-Jones writes at the BBC blog dot.life about his testing of Fire Eagle. I was disappointed that he didn't seem to get or take advantage of the control users have of their location information, but I was impressed he stated the problems he ran into and how he didn't get LBS.

First the problems:

That's the theory. In practice, I've found a couple of problems. I need to make the effort to update my location via Fire Eagle all the time - though as GPS comes to more phones that could happen automatically - and most of the time I just can't be bothered. And when I do, I'm still not sure why I want the world to know where I am.

I've tried using a couple of other services attached to Fire Eagle - but just downloading and signing up has tested my patience to the limits.

I think my main problem is the lack of a network effect - until there are plenty of location-based services and plenty of people are using them, the whole idea just won't have any mass appeal. And I'm still worried that it's a concept which may appeal more to advertisers and technology developers than to users - there does not seem to be any real "need" waiting to be fulfilled.

He bravely twitters that he doesn't get LBS only to be bombarded with tweeters "amazed that I didn't get it." He also received a tweet from Tom Coates (the Yahoo person leading the Fire Eagle charge) noting the app hadn't really launched yet.

I take a few things away from this story, which I expect is not that unusual. First off, Fire Eagle would not be the app I'd use to promote the wonders of LBS. As I've noted, it's for managing LBSs; in and of itself, it's not an LBS. Clearly, unless you are a bit sold on LBS, Fire Eagle is perhaps not worth your time for the reasons Rory mentions. Second, there's a sense, echoed by the Twitter responses, that acceptance of and demand for LBS is somehow genetic (or should be). That news hasn't reached Rory or dare I say many others on the planet. The marketing machine for LBS hasn't created the demand for some chunk of the market (yet). Finally, there's still this lingering notion that LBS is for advertisers, not for those sharing their locations. If LBS is to be ubiquitous, that sentiment needs to be overcome.