Fire-Wired Blog

This article was first published by  dmcityview.com As cool as Justin Timberlake is, what’s the first thing you think of when you hear his name? He’s a singer, right? Nevermind that for the  last decade J.T. has been trying desperately to be taken seriously as an actor. Shifting public perception is hard — for entertainers, politicians, companies, even websites. No one is learning that lesson harder than the once-popular location-based application Foursquare. In 2009, at the South By Southwest Interactive technology conference, or SXSWi, Foursquare dominated the hearts and minds of the tech world. Foursquare provided a social network for smartphone users to check in online to locations and share with their friends where parties were, what restaurants were exciting, and basically any location that was happening at that moment. The cherry on top of the GPS cake was Foursquare’s scoreboard for user check-ins, “Mayorships” for users who checked in the most at specific locatio...

This article was first published by  dmcityview.com There are two sacred cows in smartphone-user experience: battery life and constant connection to information. One of the best features of smartphones is the ability to notify users of new content through a background tool known as push notifications. For years popular services such as email, text messages and social networks have used push notifications to alert users of updates with little uproar, but a new trend in application development is pitting these two sacred cows against each other. Since Foursquare wove user geographic location into the social media universe back in 2009, developers have been frothing at the mouth to capitalize on user location. Global positioning system (GPS) technology has been a standard feature on all smartphones since the original iPhone. At a moment’s notice, users can find directions, traffic information and local businesses, but too much GPS use drains the phone’s battery extremely fast. U...

This article was first published by dmcityview.com You may not be aware, but you are living in a war zone. Central Iowa is currently besieged by two warring factions that are fighting for the future of our very existence. Why haven’t you heard anything about this on the news? Because it’s occurring on a plane of existence only visible through specially-equipped devices… and it’s a game. Last November Google unveiled “Ingress,” a free, augmented-reality, geocaching mobile game. While most video games are played on computers and gaming consoles, Ingress is played in the real world with smartphones. Similar to other role-playing games, Ingress players (known as agents) collect weapons, attack points and claim battle sites known as “portals.” Plus players are split into two factions: the Resistance and the Enlightened. While that may all sound like the recipe for yet another nerdy video game, the tech and effort required to actually play Ingress are really cool. Augmented-reality is ...

This article was first published by dmcityview.com A recent Nielsen survey revealed that now more than 51 percent of adult Americans own smartphones. It’s no mystery why. Web searches, mobile applications, social networks and much more supply its users with answers to nearly any question within seconds of being asked. But what about providing answers to questions that you’d never think to ask? Location, location, location. No matter if you’re standing in Manhattan, Des Moines or Pohdunk, your phone is the divining rod to the undiscovered adventures and information surrounding you. Location and GPS-enabled smartphone applications host treasure troves of data, reviews and details on nearly every business, school, state park and everything in between. Yelp and TripAdvisor, maybe the most popular and easy to adopt for gadget novices, allow their users to search for specific businesses or categories for information. Foursquare, a GPS-enabled social network and discovery application, all...