Mobile App to Comment The World

Annotate Anything and Everything

Want to comment on a tree or a rock? Currently in the planning phase is a mobile smartphone app for commenting on any random thing.

Let's say you're wandering around somewhere any you encounter an interesting rock. You're wondering what is the story behind the rock? Does anyone else know something about it?

This would be an app to allow you to both leave comments and read what others have written.

The idea would be a smartphone app available on iOS from the AppStore or on Android from Google Play which would use geolocation and allow the user to add a comment related to that location, as well as photos, videos, etc. The comments and notes would be attached to the location, it could be a tree, a rock, a building, a statue - or just any place.

Other users can then read the comment as well as find other comments and notes left in nearby locations.

This is a little bit similar to FourSquare, though FourSquare seems to focus more on specific places (restaurants and businesses), rather than a tree in the woods. It could become sort of a "virtual tour guide" - providing information about things that may not have a sign in front of them and that don't appear in a tour book.

For example, let's say you are doing a small hiking trek on a mountain. You're following the trail, and you come aross a stream. It's not obvious how to cross the stream, or if the trail is even supposed to go to the other side.

So you pull out your smartphone running this handy app. The app figures out where you are (either by GPS or a cellphone signal) and shows you comments that others have posted near your location. You look at one that says, "To cross the stream, it's easiest to walk 10 feet downstream and use the rocks there." Someone else has posted, "It's easy to cross in August because there is almost no water running at that time of year."

Great! You cross the stream and post a comment yourself, "Note that the path goes to the right after the stream - it's easy to miss."

You also notice someone has posted a comment for further along the trail, saying, "It's worth taking the detour to the scenic vista point. It's only about 10 minutes each way, and the views are incredible!"

And of course you can attach photos and videos to these posts. These could together form sort of a virtual tour or virtual hike that you could look at beforehand, maybe even before deciding whether you want to go on the hike or not.

This would be useful in suburban or urban areas as well. Perhaps someone knows some trivia about a statue, or knows an interesting legend about an old house. You can annotate your town online, just like leaving secret notes for others, but online.

This service would of course also be available on the website, allowing users to add, view, and edit comments and photos there.

What do you think? Click the Contact Us link above to let us know. Thanks! This would probably start with iPhone and Android, available from Apple's App Store on iTunes or Google Play.