As some you might have heard of we have working on re-doing the profile pages and when doing that we also want to make it easier for community members to stay connected with each other and give input (comments/upvoting etc) on the sequences. We sometimes get the question if we will allow to follow other people in the community, similar to what you do on twitter och instagram.
I am very curious about this and would love to understand more. Please share your thoughts on how you would like a following function to look like. Would you prefer to follow people, places or an interest (such as bikers, hikers)? How would you use a follow function?
I have been missing the option to send a message to someone. Just to say hello to the people who map the same area as me. I know I can comment a specific picture, but it is not really the same.
But actually the option to send messages to people who have mapped within a certain area, would be greater. If I hear that a house or an areas is to be torn down, but cannot find the time to photograph it, other people might.
With regarding to follow, I would prefer to be able to follow activity in an area, e.g. where I was born or grew up.
I agree with @tryl, it would be great to send messages directly to others mappers.
Also an option to indicate approximately where we are live in addition with a means to send a message to these persons.
I would also like a feed with other people’s activity or new photos in an area. Currently, I receive a mail each time there is an upload in areas I’m following. Unfortunately, I follow the area I’m mapping, to be informed of other people’s contributions, so I’ve a mail each time I upload a new sequence !
I like some of that. I’m curious how much of this could be covered with more robust options for the filters on the maps. for example, if I could restrict it to images from the last month & users who are not me.
I would be interested in both following users and precise locations. A couple of user stories to illustrate that:
Users
Jane and John are doing a very interesting trip. I’ve seen a couple of sequences they posted recently and I found them great and interesting. I don’t know where they are planning to go next, but I can’t wait to see the next sequences they are going to post. Being notified each time they post a sequence or a group of sequences would be great: checking their “uploads” page twice a week is a bit cumbersome.
Locations
I’m interested in the Mediterranean see and surrounding areas. This covers several countries, but the only things I’m actually interested in are the sea and its surroundings. Being able to follow this area (regardless the way we define it: (group of) squares, circles, free shapes…) would be great: I’m currently following all the involved countries to avoid missing anything, but only 10% of the notifications I receive are actually interesting to me.
