After announcing the expansion of the service last year, Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley has now launched it BeeBot: An AI-powered social app for iPhones that keeps you updated on what’s happening nearby. IN announcement on his blogCrowley says the BeeBot acts like a “personalized radio DJ” that delivers location-based audio updates through your headphones and keeps you informed as you walk about what your friends are up to, local news and events happening in your area.
“Audio updates are designed to be short and sweet (a few sentences here and there), tailored to your interests and social graphs, and designed to both inspire and inform,” Crowley says in the announcement. “Our experience will be more like Waze meetings Gossip Girl” and less “Wikipedia in your ears.”
While the app is called “BeeBot for AirPods,” Crowley says it supports any wired or wireless headphones and Bluetooth-based audio devices, including speakers, car stereos and wearables like Meta Ray-Ban shrewd glasses. It’s always on, turning on automatically when you put the headphones on and turning off when you take them out. BeeBot will lower the volume and speak over any music you’re listening to and automatically pause and resume podcasts when it wants to speak, but it won’t disturb you during phone calls or video chats.
However, this will not be a repeated occurrence. Crowley says users can receive updates from BeeBot multiple times a day, “but not 10 times a day,” to prevent undue inconvenience. Updates are pulled from a variety of sources, including current locations and status updates from other BeeBot users, and operate “keywords” you provide about your interests to suggest local places and events you can check out.
According to Crowley, the app is “still in beta” and the news it provides is expected to be “more gossipy than informative.” As it currently stands, BeeBot provides the best service in walkable American cities, as opposed to when users ride a car, bike, or subway. For now, it’s only available to iOS users in the US, and Crowley says a CarPlay version is in development.