Comments on: UpNext – The Future of Local is Here Now! Yelp who?

By: Joel

Joel — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I think this is great software and a well built product by UpNext. But they just don’t get it when it comes to designing web apps.

I had to wait for about 3 minutes until this map loaded (and the “future visits will be much faster” message did nothing to make it less unpleasant). Then what I got was a poor version of a flight simulator with 30 scattered events (none of which were interesting). I don’t know who would spend all that time loading the map in order to enter local events (or even look them up). Like most users, all I care about is accessing relevant data QUICKLY. If I had some kind of social schedule that was dependent on having a 3D view of the city, maybe this would be useful… As it is, it seems like it would work better for counter-terrorism or some other tactical exercise than social planning.

Do you have money invested with these people or something? Cause I’m pretty open, I’ll try any kind of social site. But, honestly, this was one of the worst ones I’ve played with in a long, long time. The map is cute, don’t get me wrong…but when I’m going out in the city, I just need cross streets. The 3-D flyover is a bit of overkill. Good luck to you, UpNext…you’ll need it.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

this is amazing, the map itself is awesome and you can move around really well within it once it’s loaded. can’t wait for the facebook feature!

By: Raj Advani

Raj Advani — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ouch! Well, I won’t disagree with you that other sites are much faster if you’re just looking for cross streets, or if you already know what you’re looking for. But what we’re aiming for is the ability to explore a neighborhood, click through buildings, and find new things visually. The 3D gives us an expressive canvas to play with. Over time we’ll be able to make the graphics convey large amounts of information at a glance, without suffering from the icon-clutter of 2D. As for load-times, newer technologies are bringing those down fast (Java Update N, faster hard-drives, greater bandwidth). We have a lot of thinking and work to do (not so much luck), but we believe we can make this work! Thanks for the input.

By: Jason

Jason — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Site loaded up in about 45 sec the first time and less then 10 sec the next time. This is truly an amazing piece of work. Sure there’s some issues I’d like to see ironed out and some features I’d like to see, but the previous posts seem like they felt threatened… that’s a GOOD thing, guys. I’m still trying to figure out some of the functions, but from what I’ve seen so far (the ease of flying thru the map, the ability to find surrounding local businesses, reviews, social features, etc). Great start, I’m really enjoying the site and can’t wait to see it in my city.

By: Raj Advani

Raj Advani — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Hi Robin,

Thanks for giving it a try (or two). We’re trying to sort out the remaining videocard incompatibilities we’re experiencing. If you happen to know what kind of videocard you’re using, would you mind emailing that to me at radvani7 -at – hotmail.com? It would help a lot!

(On Windows, you can find out what videocard you’re using by going to your dekstop, clicking properties and then going to the display tab. It appears under the Display: heading)

By: Robin Wauters

Robin Wauters — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Installing the applet caused Firefox to call it a day, and when I re-opened the browser and got back to the UpNext website, my computer spontaneously rebooted …

Of course, I did exactly the same to see if I could reproduce, and down it went again.

I said ‘damn’ alright :)