Earth Spot Map

[spotmap]

Hey everyone - this is Harrison from 4ply mag

I’ve been working on a spot map app for spots, skater owned shops, businesses, food etc and figured I’d turn to slap for some honest feedback about what other spot maps/apps have done wrong in the past and what would make one nice.

So far the major things I’m addressing are
Moderation - creating a system that lets the community self regulate
Friends - being done in a way that lets people share spots privately
Private spots - if people want to use this as a private place to keep all their spots to share with their friends and no one else that is fine and totally the point

Browser based maps are generally terrible on mobile and the ones I’m aware of (no disrespect) aren’t much more user friendly on desktop either. I’ve seen one other skate spot map on the app store (there might be more on android) and personally I’ve found it difficult to use and just a little strange.

Please feel free be as rude/honest as you like, I’m looking for feedback from real skaters and all my friends are being too nice about it. Not sure what the rules are about plugging things here so I won’t link it but if you want to see what I’ve done so far search Earth Spot Map on the app store (iOS only at the moment sorry).

Cheers

[apbarbs]

(i don't have an iPhone so i haven't seen the app, so all my comments are missing that context)

- no Android seems like it'd be a big dealbreaker if you want social/sharing features - i see a lot of apps that launch as iOS-only get stuck as iOS-only if they don't get funding - i imagine you're too far in the development process to switch, but a map application seems like it'd be reasonable on React-Native so you can make it cross platform
- ^ to this point, is there a reason why this is a native app rather than a web app? i see you say "Browser based maps are generally terrible on mobile" - does this mean the Google Maps SDK (or whatever maps SDK you're using) has much better UX on iOS than on web? one potential upside i can think of for a native app is the ability to associate photos in the user's photo album with a spot, without having to store photos on your server/aws/whatever - although this seems like minimal upside considering you want social/sharing features - getting users to try the app would be much easier if it was a web app rather than a native app, and i'm not seeing a technical reason this needs to be a native app
- you'll want a way to upload a number of photos per spot
- a lot of people who would be power users of such an app will already have spot lists somewhere else - it's probably a good idea for you to have the ability to import data from Google Maps (see https://takeout.google.com/) and Apple Maps (unsure what their format is)

[WarmUpZone]

I'm stoked on Earth Spot Map. I feel like these user-generated things need to hit a tipping point of spots uploaded before it can be the go-to app for finding spots when traveling. But I've enjoyed uploading my spot photos and used it a bit for some spot tourism when in the Bay Area.

For all the fun of checking out and taking photos of famous spots is, I found that adding (and finding) more local, small, non-famous spots is rewarding. Out to lunch and see a nice waxed bench... add it to the map. Visiting the folks an hour away, check the map and realize there are some curbs nearby. Better throw the board in the trunk.

The biggest challenge is getting people to participate. It would be amazing to even get some pros to log some spots (that aren't needing to be kept on the down low). Like, imagine having access to Tom K's spot book!

[spotmap]

(i don't have an iPhone so i haven't seen the app, so all my comments are missing that context)

- no Android seems like it'd be a big dealbreaker if you want social/sharing features - i see a lot of apps that launch as iOS-only get stuck as iOS-only if they don't get funding - i imagine you're too far in the development process to switch, but a map application seems like it'd be reasonable on React-Native so you can make it cross platform
- ^ to this point, is there a reason why this is a native app rather than a web app? i see you say "Browser based maps are generally terrible on mobile" - does this mean the Google Maps SDK (or whatever maps SDK you're using) has much better UX on iOS than on web? one potential upside i can think of for a native app is the ability to associate photos in the user's photo album with a spot, without having to store photos on your server/aws/whatever - although this seems like minimal upside considering you want social/sharing features - getting users to try the app would be much easier if it was a web app rather than a native app, and i'm not seeing a technical reason this needs to be a native app
- you'll want a way to upload a number of photos per spot
- a lot of people who would be power users of such an app will already have spot lists somewhere else - it's probably a good idea for you to have the ability to import data from Google Maps (see https://takeout.google.com/) and Apple Maps (unsure what their format is)

- Fortunately it is built using React Native so switching it over hopefully won't be too much drama, I just don't have an android phone at the moment so it's kind of hard. Having said that, I have a web/data background so everything is set up to work cross platform and hopefully won't take too long to set up.
- I had built a browser based map before this (I'll admit this was for a skate shop's website through Shopify so much more limiting) and it just wasn't as fast, uploads were painful and on mobile there were just too many issues. If you look at the difference between Google Maps in browser vs the Google Maps app, this is basically the difference.
- Yes, can upload multiple photos per spot!
- And yes, we have the ability to import .kml files from Google My Maps. If anyone has a list they'd like to see imported please reply with it! (So far we've had zips with 300+ Osaka spots, 400+ Ohio spots, every real life spot from the Tony Hawk games, Berlin spots and some scattered European lists.)

Right now this is just one skater doing this between skates, but I'm always refining and adding new stuff so I'm very open to feedback.

[moonordie]

This is not already been done by Shinner?

[spotmap]

This is not already been done by Shinner?

Yeah, they're definitely doing something similar and God bless them. They look like they have some serious money behind them and they're servicing an amount of people that I could never afford to (or want to).

Personally I've just never seen a spot map that lets you share spots privately with friends (which is how most skaters seem to want to use it) so I made one that does. The goal originally was just to make this in a way that would be easy and stress free for me and my friends but it's way easier to let it be worldwide than limit it.

I am not trying to blow this up at all, simply because I have no intention of monetising it. Just looking for honest feedback to make it as useful and fun as possible at a time when all my other apps are becoming hellscapes. Growing a nice little self-regulating community like Slap on there sounds really nice as well, but I would hate for it to become anything like any of the other spot maps I've seen.