Picture this: You are in a mall. And since it’s a holiday, you are wondering if any of your friends is also there, in the same mall. If so, you’d like to connect with them and have a fun time together, wouldn’t you? But how to find out? You can’t go on calling each of your friends and asking. Well, here comes the solution in the form of a new Android app.
Name:
The app is called NaviGale – Navigate to Fun 
What It Does :
The app can serve two purposes. One, to help you find your friends (Facebook and Phone contacts) that might be near you. And two, to help you discover new friends around you that share the same interests as you.
What this app does is browse through your friends and groups on Facebook and find out people from there that are, or have been recently, in the vicinity near you. It provides a list of these people, presenting the following information.
1. Facebook ID’s, of course.
2. Distance they are from you, also indicating the direction of their presence
3. Time or day when they were in the place picked up by the app.
4. Number of mutual friends, if any.
5. Number of shared interest. These are basically the Facebook groups you both are part of.
You can tap on any person’s bar in this list and move on to the page from where you can start conversing with him or her. Here you get some additional options, besides the info displayed in the list. You can choose to switch on the Map displaying your and the other person’s location. You can tap on the ‘Hey’ button, to connect with the person.
The app runs in the background and notifies you if any of your friend or ‘interesting person’ is near where you are. It offers free Chat and Messaging service.
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Settings:
The settings of this app offers some options to enable you to control your privacy.
1. You can choose between making your location visible to all ‘Like Minded’ people, or only your friends.
2. You can also choose to stay hidden for 1 to 5 days.
3. The settings also allow you to choose the Facebook groups from where you would like the app to find friends for you.
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UI:
User Interface is simple enough. As soon as you open the app, you get the list that displays the people near you, and the shared interests and friends between you and also the distance they are from you, as well as the time of their presence there.
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What I Like:
1. Ease of Use: The app is really easy and simple to use.
2. Good Idea: Seems like quite a good idea to me. It would make finding friends who are nearby so easy. The inbuilt map feature adds to the usability.
3. Free: Oh yes, it’s free!
4. According to the app’s page on Google Play, ‘It’s a full combo messenger which includes Facebook + Foursquare + Hike + WhatsApp + Kik + Viber + Google Maps.’
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What I’m Not So Keen Upon:
1. The app is designed to help you discover new like minded friends. However, I’m not so sure how many people would be interested in connecting with total strangers on the go, just because they happen to be nearby and part of the same Facebook Groups. Considering especially the current times and how it is difficult trusting even one’s neighbour!
2. The list that the app displayed also included people who were near to me 2, 3, even 5 days ago! I don’t know what use that might be for me.
3. The app has been launched by SocialAppsHQ, ‘a provider of All in One social media marketing software.’ A fact, that isn’t made quite so clear on the NaviGale’s page on Google Play, or on the developer’s website.
SocialAppsHQ is a social media marketing platform that helps its customers to ‘Listen & Monitor for any keyword across the web using Social Media Monitoring, Engage via Social Planner and run super viral campaigns using our largest Facebook App store on planet.‘ Now, my concerns might be ill-founded of course, but I personally don’t feel comfortable allowing entry into my Facebook profile to any app launched by someone who can ‘Listen and Monitor’ my profile and contacts and also transfer the information to others so they can use it in their social media marketing campaigns.
UPDATE: Seems like my concerns weren’t ill founded. The app seems to have been removed from Google Play!
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Jyoti Arora
Author of Dream’s Sake, Samsung Mobiler
DREAM’S SAKE
