Updated 2/12/2025
Swarm stopped working for me. I can’t accept the terms and conditions because there is some kind of error. They claimed they were going to improve and update Swarm, but they have done nothing to it. They claim they made it “easier” to add new places, but that does not matter if the app fails to work.
Updated 10/24/2024
I just recently received an e-mail from Foursquare saying they’re shutting down the Foursquare City Guide effective January 2025. I don’t know why they would do this. In the past I contributed a number of pictures to the Foursquare city guide through using the swarm app. The problem is I’m still upset Foursquare used to work great then they changed it into Swarm it never recovered from this. I still used it because I like to keep track of where I was going in particular on vacations. I don’t see why we can’t go back to regular Foursquare the way it used to be. I know that it wasn’t making enough money and I know that’s why the developer invented Swarm it was supposed to be if you were in with a really tight group of people you could all do things together but nobody was people were just on their own and they weren’t in a big group of people only competing amongst themselves. There’s so many ways that you could get a big group of people together. You could send them all emails you could send them all text messages. Why would you create an entire app called Swarm to do something that’s very basic? Because nobody wanted to use Swarm they removed the check-ins from Foursquare and put them in Swarm but that still didn’t make Swarm popular. I should have left Swarm right then when all my friend and family who were on it did. I’m one of these inflexible people still hanging on to the way things used to be.
I don’t know how Foursquare or Swarm could have make money. They could have added advertisements to Foursquare. They could have also charged a nominal fee. I know the original owner sold it to someone else. They have been doing nothing to it, not even maintaining the app. When Foursquare was cool, I might have paid to support it. But, Swarm has the feeling of being fake and terrible. Foursquare was awesome before it became Swarm which ruined it completely. I hated the so called “leave a tip” thing that came up upon checking in. They could have put ads in that place instead and at least made a tiny bit of money. Now the Foursquare City Guide has been removed, but they still have the leave a tip thing on there like an auto nag feature. The tips have no where to go without the City Guide. I am not upset that I can’t use Swarm anymore, but I can’t so that is the end of it unless they bring back Foursquare they way it was. As far as life blogging goes, it’s almost impossible to check your search history. If you input a date or location nothing comes up. You have to spend hours scanning and looking for particular check-ins by scrolling. Checking in is only fun when one is on vacation also. Checking into local thing is boring.
14 square satire video found 4/16/2023
Check out this comedy Video by Dartanion London on You Tube
Original article from 2019
There are many articles I can find online about Foursquare, but they were not written by people who use the app. I can tell they have a bias focus with vague predictions of profitability. Foursquare was going like gang busters in 2014. I had a number of friends who used it and even two members of my family. When Foursquare split the app into two apps, no one wanted to download use the new app called Swarm. Swarm was an extra app, and it had no reason to exist. When people refused Swarm the company decided to remove the check-ins from Foursquare and put them in Swarm forcing everyone to download Swarm. They had tons of helpful user feedback, but the refused to listen to reason. Now I have only two vague acquaintances on my Swarm, and the rest of the people I don’t know. Its not very fun to brag about all the fun places you visited if no one you know can see them. The dropping off of most everyone on Swarm upset me, and for a few years I did not use it. But I decided I liked having a memory of places I had been. For a while I only used it on vacation or only checked in when I went to a special or new place. Then I got the idea that I wanted to be tracked wherever I went, after thinking about all the missing persons cases. If I were to disappear the location tracker would mark the last place I appeared with my phone. Unless one is going to met a drug dealer there is a great benefit to a location app on one’s phone. No need to wait for a court order to open the location history if I drive off a cliff and am stuck there. I have downloaded Foursquare now, but I did not have it for a while and if I have too many apps I delete Foursquare or other less important apps.
I think Foursquare could run more ads. I never see or notice ads very much. As long as they don’t try and charge money for Swarm, I’m in. One can also check in Facebook, but that makes your feed too busy or on Twitter there is also a check in. But who is going to do that? What strangers want to know I just went to Safeway? The Yelp App is so much worse. I had the Yelp App once, but it did not work at all. I always never used Yelp anymore. I don’t want the app on my phone, and they make it very hard to log into Yelp. Most people go to the website to look for things. No one has space or time to deal with so many apps. Most people just keep a few apps that are useful on their phones.
I don’t have Facebook on my phone because it’s too big and invasive. They give out your phone number to people, and I had unwanted phone calls with the Messenger App. I use Facebook at the computer or on iPad. There used to be a button on Messenger that would get pushed and it would say “you just called so and so”, and I am like what? Facebook also now demands a phone number. I used to put in a fake number, but they all want phone verification. I have much more animosity for Facebook then Foursquare, but my friends and family are on Facebook so I am stuck with it.
Macy Makes Magic 