Staying up-to-date on what’s happening in your local community isn’t as easy as it should be. Sure, you have a plethora of sources, from online publications to social media channels, to update you on big news and events. But when it comes to the littler things — like a food truck handing out freebies, train delays or a lost dog — there's no simple way to stay in the loop.
That’s the basic problem that Graavity seeks to solve: The app, built by Northeastern student Cameron Sun, lets you post and find almost anything happening around you.
"Graavity was born from this frustration with the lack of a good medium for real-time local information,” Sun told me in an email interview.
The need for this sort of app became clear during the Brigham and Women's shooting in January. Sun’s friend, who was a volunteer, was walking toward to hospital when she saw police cars and helicopters surrounding the area. With no clue as to what was going on, she spent several minutes Googling “Boston shooting” befores she could finally put the pieces together.
“With a lower profile crime or event, it's doubtful she would've found anything at all,” Sun noted. “It just feels wrong to me that, in a world with such unbounded access to information, you have to try so hard just to hear about the things happening right around you.”
Ideally, Graavity will fill that gap — by enabling people to quickly browse or post about a range of updates, whether a new MFA exhibit or a sofa for sale nearby.
“The things that you'd want to see on Graavity are going to be the things that are too specific to post on traditional social media,” added Sun. “A warning that the steps in front of your apartment building are icy and slippery is useless to 99 percent of people you know, but very applicable you're coming or going from the building that day. This highly specific nature of information makes it easy for Graavity to show people only what's really relevant to them.”
The app automatically pulls in your geographic location, and then shows you recent stories that people post near you in real-time. Follow friends and let them follow you, and you always have the option of submitting content that’s only visible to your followers — whether that’s checking in at a local bar or planning an impromptu get together.
Graavity has been in private beta for over a month, and is currently in the approval process on the app store. If approved, Sun believes it could be publicly releasing as early as this week.
Going forward, he says the main features he’s hoping to add are search and tagging: The combination of these two aspects will empower users to better hone in on what they’re most interested in seeing around their area.
Screenshot courtesy of Cameron Sun.
