AlwaySocial: Social Networking in the Real World

Social networking is nowadays a popular way for people to socialize and network professionally. Currently, social networking websites provide a mostly online experience whether they are accessed from a computer or a mobile phone. This leads to a chasm between online social activities and those done in the actual world. As there is no direct way to turn an online acquaintance to a real friend, users are required to constantly synchronize between the two activities. Social Proximity Applications (SPA) aim to introduce technology into real world networking in order to facilitate it. However, they often use proprietary and restricted profile systems and therefore do not bridge the online/offline gap. In this paper we present AlwaysSocial, a Facebook based SPA that allows users to discover other nearby users, chat with them, and retain their Facebook contact information in case they wish to become online friends. It enhances networking by making a user’s public Facebook profile available to other nearby users. Since the system is proximity based, any digital interaction can be quickly turned into face-to-face interaction and vice versa. ACM Classification: H5.2 [Information interfaces and presentation]: User Interfaces. Graphical user interfaces. General terms: Design, Human Factors.