Gigwalk – Your Smartphone Pays

Get paid to use your smartphone and it's inbuilt location based system.

At Gigwalk, you can take a 'gig' or set a 'gig'. Say your local council needs a photo of the pothole people have been complaining about up on 11th. They log in said 'gig' and up it goes on the network. Then, let's call him Marco, Marco gets an alert, he's on 11th and is the closest man for the job. Up he goes to said pothole, snaps an image and he's, say $10, richer.



The council gets a shot of the situation they need to deal with, and Marco earns a little cash for being in the right place at the right time with the right kind of phone.

Gigwalk goes past snapping images of useful information and offers up the 'gig' options of; free text, descriptions or reviews; multiple choice answers; yes or no questions; and they've got audio and video 'gig' options coming soon.

It's interesting to look at my iPhone and see an investment in employment. Right place, right time works for me, but one wonders what could amount should someone be able to commit to be a full time Gigwalker.

Getaround – Share Your Car

Getaround is a social car sharing service. You can rent your car out by the hour, by the day or by the week for the times when you're not using it.

Immediate thoughts would be, why would I share my car with a stranger? The Getaround site settles a few hesitations with their tour, all cars are insured by Getaround and each member of the community is screened and reviewed after each hire. How dirty they left it, if the filled up the tank, any scratches…

The large cost of owning a car can be subsidised, and the Getaround team claim that ten cars are taken off the road per one car leased on their network. Reducing an individuals carbon emissions by 40%. Less cars on the road but just enough for us all to get around sounds good to us.



Everything booked via Getaround's iPhone app, car owners simply install a Getaround CarKit into their cars to enable renters access the car via smartphone.

Having just landed the Techcrunch Disrupt NYC prize, Getaround can now sink in an additional USD50,000 to their already existing funding from General Catalyst Partners, Barney Pell and others.

With no sign up fees for the renter or the car owner, you can sign up your car and get the CarKit if your vehicle's younger than a 1994 model, seats up to eight, is a private vehicle with four wheels and has a maximum horsepower of 400hp for SUVs and 300hp for cars.

Drivoid – Driving Redefined

Taxis, limousines, designated drivers, party buses - Drivoid wants to link to them all. 

Looking to create a US-wide network of driving services, Drivoid want to connect their members to a wealth of vehicle resources. Cleaning up drunk driving acts through a dependable list of multiple options to get you to and from home safely and in however style you choose. 

A shot above from the Scooter Angels we once profiled. Drivoid also screens their drivers through thorough background checks and ensures a clean track record when it comes to private providers. A rating system post service provided adds to the reputation building on the site. 

Looking to act as the platform cutting out multiple middle men, Drivoid promote the opportunity to earn as a driver, and save as a passenger. Also hosting an interface of calendar organisation that gets seeded as online information throughout the network. 

Passengers are able to book from 15 minutes to a month in advance, all online, with 24 hour support at their disposal. 

Soon to focus on the main coverage areas Seattle, LA, Orange County, San Diego and San Francisco. Here's to a worldwide network democratising the driving service industry.

Ditto-Your Social Life Networked

'Foursquare on steroids' indeed.

Ditto presents a mobile app that organises and socialises your social life in some smooth ways.

With Ditto you're able not only to broadcast what you feel like eating to your social network, but immediately source a place to satisfy your craving, and easily recruit those interested. Other options for socialising your social life also include seeing what movies are available nearby, seeing which friends have seen it, aggregating their reviews, and heading to see it with the friends who would be up for joining in.

Linked up through Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook APIs Ditto is a great service that goes past the 'broadcast' and takes it to the next level of social collaboration.

The latest from Jaiku founder Jyri Engestrom, Ditto is also looking to branch out into book and music recommendations. With Jaiku having been swallowed up and acquired many moons ago by Google, could Ditto be looking at another such acquisition?

The pathway upwards away from the simple act of sharing to collaboration seems one certainly worth swallowing up yet.

Like A Little

A 'Flirting Facilitator Platform', Like A Little is Craigslist's Missed Connections real-time. At this point, mostly available for students of campuses across America, Like A Little aggregates a stream of real-time comments "Girl wearing yellow in my French class, you're cute." or "I like you row two, three from the projector." etcetera.

Like A Little streams every comment anonymously and you can pick up a conversation with any of those who are writing in. Giving each user an anonymous handle named after a fruit 'blueberry', 'banana', 'orange' leads to a lighthearted fruitbowl of commentary and conversation.

The testimonial section of the website attests to lots of friendships made and crushes tended to. Linked up with a browser based location sharing, you can scale the comment streams to 'nearby', but what about taking it all the way to which tutor room is 'apple' crushing from now?

A very sweet idea, the Like A Little platform have also opened up an API to game developers. Hoping to expose the platform to further interaction they muse on the phrase 'the Zynga of LAL (Like A Little)'. A hovering chat in the bottom right also harkens to some Facebook inspired interactivity. And here's the charm, real-time, mobile, location based hook-ups, Like A Little on the app store.