Palringo the mobile group messaging company has recently launched location-based group chat. What it does is allow anyone to find an online chat as per their interest. Palringo has announced the addition of features to it’s existing messaging service. This includes geotagging groups based on location to make it easier for people to find local communities of interest; searching by category, keyword or interest; and browsing by group stats, such as most active, types of messages, etc.
With localized chat, there can be two different approaches: pinning clusters of users together automatically behind the scenes, or letting users create/join geotagged rooms on their own. Palringo has gone with the latter approach.
What exactly is geotagging? It is marking a video, photo or other media with a location. This is really useful when people want information based on location. Geotagging can not only help people find images and information based on a location, but it can also be used to create location-based news and media feeds by combining an application like Google Maps with geotagged blogs, news articles and Flickr. This is done by adding geographical identification metadata to media such as photographs, videos, news etc. The geographical identification can use latitude and longitude coordinates, altitude, bearing, distance, accuracy data, and place names.
Geotagging can tell users the location of the content of a given picture or other media or the point of view, and conversely on some media platforms shows media relevant to a given location.
Palringo use this tool for field inspection and their new geotagging features allow each new group to be geotagged with a location around which it centers. This essentially allows you to connect with people nearby and to improve the interaction quality both with the people you connect with and the conversations you hold. All groups can be viewed on a map. You can keep tapping around until you find one that fits your interests.
The Groups Directory makes it possible for users to search for groups that interest them, letting them browse the groups as per their interest. Users can also check out the most popular groups and get a sense of what is happening within the group. They can also use the search function to find a group by any keyword, including their interests or location.
Group Stats allows users who are browsing groups to get a sense of the activity within the group before joining; they are able to quickly see how many active users a group has, which users are most active, and provides a sampling of messages so that potential members can get a sense of the discussions happening.
Martin Rosinski, founder and CTO, Palringo states: “Palringo doesn’t just support sending messages to people you already know – we offer an opportunity to connect and communicate with people all over the globe who share your interests,” “We’ve seen explosive growth within our community and have heard from users about groups discussing everything from game strategies to revolutionary protests, to organizing club meetings at a particular pub. Our new discovery features will help our users to form new connections and find groups that are talking about their passions and interests.”
What remains to be seen is whether these features keep up Palringo’s as not just another “Q&A service”.
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