We're really excited about the Apple OS 4.0 announcements today.
This will mean that we can bring the full Loopt experience to our iPhone users so you know what's going on around you right now, where your friends are, and what they're doing without having to even launch the app.
Two years ago, at Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference, we said that Loopt makes serendipity happen. Serendipity is all about accidental discovery. That can mean finding out that a friend is eating at a nearby restaurant, but it also means unexpectedly receiving an alert that an old friend is sitting in the airport two gates away from you waiting for her flight. Or telling you when a cool event is happening that you've told us you're interested in.
Loopt has offered these features on many of our devices for a long time, and our users love it. We can now plan to bring the full Loopt experience to the iPhone as well, and our users can expect to see it the moment OS 4.0 ships this summer.
What's really important in all this is keeping the user in control. We allow our users a "hybrid" model of Check Ins and background updates, and this is the model we'll adopt for our iPhone users too. That is, you might Check In and tell many friends exactly where you are right now (optionally posting to Facebook and Twitter). But for a smaller subset of friends and family, you can choose to keep them informed all the time about where you are without having to Check In or even launch the app. And you always have full privacy control.
We're really excited about what this is going to mean for our iPhone users. We look forward to hearing what you think too! Please comment here, or visit the Help section on our site.
From what I gather from the 4.0 preview, location services that run in the background use only cell tower triangulation to locate you. Will the new Loopt for iPhone 4.0 be limited to this, or is there a way you can also use real GPS?
Posted by: Ricardo | April 12, 2010 at 09:38 AM