HiMyTribe helps iPhone, iPod touch users network with GPS [review]

For the last couple of weeks I've been playing with Never Alone Anymore's HiMyTribeiPhone/iPod touch app, which lets users network (for business or pleasure) using the device's built-in GPS functionality.

A social networking tool, HiMyTribe fuses aspects of Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace with the intention of enabling individuals to network with business colleagues and potential associates in real time, on the go.

The app is the creation of four Frenchmen, two of whom -- Never Alone Anymore CEO Jean-Marc Orselli and William Bereault -- visited ZDNet HQ for a demonstration.

So what's the app do, you ask?

HiMyTribe lets you find people in your geographic area by linking members via a combination of GPS technology and a powerful criteria-based search engine. Users create 'tribes,' or groups of people they want to stay connected with and can find at any moment. When connected to the Internet via 3G or WiFi, you see where your 'tribe' is located within a few meters or around the entire world.

Basically, it's like a real-time myFaves, assuming all your friends have iPhones (or iPod touches, and are on Wi-Fi).

The app also allows you to find new people (it doesn't show their name, but shows their interests) based on their GPS location relative to you.

Why is this useful?

For people that you do know -- your "Tribe" -- it's a way to know where they are in real-time.

For people that you don't know, it's a way to network with people in real-time based on your mutual interests -- via GPS, so you know where they actually are -- but securely, thanks to the anonymity of the app.

So if you're in a city, for example, it's a neat way to get in touch with people in your industry that you wouldn't normally have crossed paths with, without knowing where they are on the corporate totem pole.

(If that were the case, everyone would message the CEO.)

Or in another example, it's a great way for journalists on the same beat to get in touch with each other, or public relations professionals searching for journalists in the area to cover an event.

Or in another, it's a way for a Spanish-speaking student struggling with their English homework to find a Spanish-speaker in the area who can help.

In fact, that's HiMyTribe's calling card: that you can find people based on hundreds of criteria combinations, from industry to "interested in" to favorite hobbies, and see where they are relative to you. In this sense, it's like LinkedIn, but with unfettered (and anonymous) communication capability.

You also have several typical tools at your disposal: direct messages, a blacklist, invitations and status updates.

Initially, the free application will allow for 20 tribe members.There will be a premium app with more functionality later, Orselli said.

So I took HiMyTribe out for a spin to see if it was to be of use in the workplace.

Impressions

The first thing that strikes me is that there are some unfinished sections of the app that need some polish. For example, some kinks to be worked out in the initial login screen, where it says "eMail" and "enter login name" rather than a slightly more legible "create a username."

Once you've done that, you're prompted with a 10+ screen terms of service agreement, which is a little off-putting (as is the Yes/No prompt to "receive information from HiMyTribe or its partners.")

To be sure, using HiMyTribe represents a bit of a leap of faith on the part of the user. Without any apparent tutorial or basic explanation of what HiMyTribe is when you start up the software, it's a bit of a stumble through the initial setup screens to get things moving and understand what HiMyTribe can do.

I don't usually recommend hand-holding, but HiMyTribe is a bit of a new concept for users, so it's worth consideration.

After the ToS, the app asks you a series of personal questions for your basic profile, such as the language you speak, your date of birth, nationality, gender and (curiously, for an iPod touch user) your phone number.

The extended profile gets more in-depth with your interests in a LinkedIn-meets-MySpace approach: "Looking For," "Business sector," "Interests," "Keywords," "I sell/buy," education level, marital status, kids, religion, height, build, ethnicity, eye and hair color are all asked of you.

Why? Because the more information you're willing to offer (most of everything's optional, but you're ruining your own experience if you don't participate), the more likely and accurate each Tribe member can find each other. Really, it's a big (anonymous) reference database -- so if you want to meet other IT pros, or perhaps local Lutherans, or people who also speak Farsi, or maybe fellow Texas Longhorns fans -- or someone who matches of the above -- you can.

I stumbled across some Euro-translation app issues here, too, by the way: I don't know my height in centimeters, and HiMyTribe doesn't offer me a conversion, even though I specified in an earlier field that I was from the United States of Imperial Measurements.

The options for ethnicity are curious, too: Despite the European heritage of the app, "Asian" is one mega category, but "African American" and "African" and "North African" are differentiated. ("Midle Eastern" [sic] and "my eyes color" [sic] need copy edits, too.)

And somehow, "dark brown" is the only option for brunettes out there, while "grey" and "greying" are distinct options. So there's more to polish.

After entering your information, you search your location for matches.

And that's where HiMyTribe gets interesting.

Social networking by geolocation

Despite being in its unannounced infancy, the app for me surfaced six people in New York within two miles of where I was standing, including one person that was "looking for tech journalists." (It also surfaced, under a "Beyond" heading, people from as far away as 8,000 miles.)

Once you find someone worth connecting with, you can click "Actions" and either send them a message, add them to your tribe, add them to a blacklist, or report profile abuse.

The problem is that it's unclear how to find people you know, since profiles don't list names. You can only search the HiMyTribe world by one or more traits (nationality, industry, etc.), but you can't search by a name, since that contradicts the secure anonymity of the app. The workaround is by going into the "My Tribe" menu, where you're able to look up people you know via "add a friend." One catch, though -- you need to know that person's login username. No proper name searching is available, because HiMyTribe never asks you for your name.

In the My Tribe menu, the "update my latest news" option allows you to post a status update, so to speak. But why that's in that menu, and not your profile menu (like Facebook), is also beyond me.

Unfortunately, you can't preview your own profile, either.

A couple more strings that needed to be tied up: summaries on others' profiles were written in illegibly tiny type; the "HiMyTribe FAQ" and "About Us" listed in the profile menu offered 404 errors; the "cancel" button on the Search page is nonactive; the "cancel" button on your profile doesn't cancel anything (it should really say "back"; etc.

The bottom line

Despite a lack of polish that will no doubt be soon addressed, HiMyTribe is an interesting app that's worth checking out. By leveraging the iPhone and iPod touch's GPS abilities with the attributes of popular social networking apps, HiMyTribe offers an early look at the implications of mobile geolocation -- namely, the expectation that soon it won't be so novel to know exactly where a person is at a given moment.

The hurdles for HiMyTribe are high, since the service requires user participation to flourish. The bad news is that the app is not quite as intuitive to use as you'd hope; the good news is that the app is available internationally and for free.

If you're looking more something a little more substantial than another mindless game from the App Store, HiMyTribe offers a peek into the burgeoning field of location-aware tech. It's available now from Apple's App Store.