4SQ
Foursquare Will Tell You Where to Eat, What to Order
What’s the point of location-based, check-in service Foursquare? It started to let your friends know where you were. Years later, it’s so much more. And using it to record your movements and follow your friends’ movements is generating important, relevant data that recommends places you’ll like. According to a recent interview with cofounder and CEO Dennis Crowley, “People will spend less time on decisions and more time on experience, because our phones can make them for us.”
For food and restaurants, this means suggestions of where to eat, what to eat, and, potentially, what time to eat and who to eat with. To take it a step further, If the restaurant was able to you, Foursquare user X, are sitting inside, perhaps it could also understand you’re about to order the burger, medium rare, with gruyere and no bacon. This concept is called “anticipatory computing,” and it’s awesome.
The above referenced piece, while long, is worth a read. It’s a great log of Foursquare’s history and a lot of intelligent conversation about where it’s headed.
#THROUGHTHEGLASS
Roy Choi + Google Glass in LA
While some restaurant industry pros and patrons take a decidedly anti-Google Glass stance, Roy Choi embraces them in LA, creating a video to demonstrate a great use case: finding, creating, and sharing recipes.
“Food is about sharing. What’s great about Glass is that I can record it and share it instantly. Maybe that will influence someone else to find their own angle.” He searches for a recipe for Irish stew (in honor of St. Patrick’s Day.) Then he records and shares his twist on the recipe. (He even takes a phone call from his mom during the process, which is adorably hilarious. The video is well-done, and worth a watch. And, no matter which side of the Glass fence you’re on, there’s no denying it’s going to be great for cooking. (Bonus: onion-chopping protection!)
FUN
Pizza Madness at Franny’s in Brooklyn
Move over March Madness, it’s time for Pizza Madness at one of my favorite Brooklyn restaurants. Yesterday, Franny’s started a pizza competition featuring a special of 16 never-before-tasted pizzas created by restaurants chefs (and Franny herself). It even has its own bracket.
By the end of service on Thursday, the Champion Pizza Showdown, Franny’s crowns a winner (based on pizza sales.) The winning pie gets a spot on the menu through the end of March. I don’t know about you, but based on name alone [insert sad, San Francisco-dwelling frown face], I’m pulling for “Pickles and Pancetta.” New York, RSVP to the Facebook event and check it out for yourself.
WELP
Food Truck Owners Respond to One-Star Review via Ukulele
How do you combat a negative Yelp review? If you’re quirky New Mexico food truck The Supper Truck, you enlist talented friends and film a rebuttal in the form of an adorable ukulele and bass song.
The song apologizes, and invites the reviewer back to give the truck another shot (“Dear Vero P., have a fried chicken bunh mi on me.”) For its part, the Food Truck has a whole slew of positive Yelp reviews (though we all know how I feel about those), so here’s hoping the owner’s creativity and willingness to work hard to satisfy every customer works out. Good luck, Supper Truck!
Digestifs
- Priceonomics analyzes Yelp’s top 100 restaurants — Priceonomics
- James Beard Award finalists announced today, were livestreamed — JBF
- Anthony Bourdain’s on Flipboard. Smart guy. — Flipboard
- Delivery service IPO madness, UK edition — TechCrunch
