Please answer questions 1 through 3. This assignment should not include references.
1. Do you think crowdfunding is an effective way to raise capital for a business endeavor? Why or why not? Give examples of a company who was successful using crowdfunding.
2. Music technology has evolved from CD's to downloads now to streaming. I love Pandora. Do you see advantages to streaming? What do musicians think about streaming music (specific examples please).
3. Are privacy concerns the only shortcoming of location-based mobile services?
Should business firms be allowed to call cell phones with advertising messages based on location? Please see attachment for question 3 reading material.

Insight on Society Foursquare: Check Your Privacy at the Door

Foursquare is one of a host of companies that combine a social network business model with location-based technology. Foursquare offers mobile social applications that know where you are located and can provide you with information about popular spots nearby, as well as reviews from other Foursquare users. Its apps also allow you to check in to a restaurant or other location, and automatically let friends on Facebook and other social networks learn where you are. Founded in 2008 by Dennis Crowley and Naveen Selvadurai, Foursquare has more than 55 million monthly active users worldwide, split fairly evenly between the United States and the rest of the world, who have checked in over 8 billion times. There’s potentially a great deal of money to be made by combining a social network with smartphone-based technology that can identify your location precisely. Location-based data has extraordinary commercial value because advertisers can then send you advertisements, coupons, and flash bargains, based on where you are located.

In 2014, Foursquare shook up its business model when it split its app into two separate apps with different focuses. Its redesigned Foursquare app became a recommender system akin to a travel guide, using passive location tracking to offer suggestions to users for where to eat or visit. A separate app, Swarm, absorbed Foursquare’s check-in feature. The redesigned app asks the user to identify things he or she likes, known as “tastes,” from over 10,000 possibilities (ranging from barbecue to museums to board games), and then provides recommendations. Rather than earn badges, users are encouraged to add tips to work toward becoming an expert. Many loyal Foursquare users were driven away by the change. In 2015, the company added many of the old features, such as status levels, mayorships (awards offered to users with the most check-ins at a particular location), and leaderboards, back to Swarm. Foursquare’s decision was influenced primarily by its continued struggles to find profitability, though it’s not for lack of trying. Foursquare has continued to develop in-app advertising products that serve advertising based on users’ locations and has formed partnerships with companies like American Express to offer discounts to cardholders after using Foursquare to check-in. Unfortunately for Foursquare, Facebook and seemingly every other social network now offer the ability to check-in and share that information with friends. However, in 2015, Foursquare shifted in a different direction with the launch of its Pinpoint product, an advertising tool that allows marketers unprecedented ability to target users based on its accumulated historical location data and to filter out inaccurate data. Most importantly, Pinpoint can even reach mobile users without the Foursquare app, a major advantage considering the company’s relatively low number of in-network users compared to other top social networks.

In 2016, Foursquare is likely to focus more on Pinpoint and other technologies that it can offer other companies than on its flagship check-in app. From 2014 to 2016, Foursquare’s revenue doubled on a year-to-year basis, including a 170% increase in its advertising solutions business in 2015. This growth has been driven primarily by data licensing agreements with other tech and social networking giants. For example, in 2014, Foursquare struck just such an agreement with Microsoft, which may use the data to customize Bing on a user-by-user basis with specific search results and advertisements based on their location data. Foursquare has also struck similar deals with Twitter, Google, Yahoo, and Pinterest to provide location-based functions and to share location data, increasing the richness and accuracy of its own data in the process. All of these partnerships greatly enrich the value of Pinpoint and allow Foursquare to track users that are not even a part of its platform. All of a sudden, Foursquare’s “lowly” 55 million users and unimpressive user growth don’t matter quite as much. In 2016, Foursquare received $45 million in new financing, albeit at a much lower valuation than its last round of financing in 2013. Crowley also stepped down as CEO as the company restructured its executive team to focus on continued development of both advertising products as well as techniques to monetize its location data. The company believes that its renewed focus on its advertising products will help it overcome the stigma of its stalled user growth.

As the popularity of location-based services like Foursquare has grown, so too have concerns about privacy. Privacy advocates point out that many apps have no privacy policy, that most of the popular apps transmit location data to their developers, after which the information is not well controlled, and that these services are creating a situation where government, marketers, creditors, and telecommunications firms will end up knowing nearly everything about citizens, including their whereabouts. Many users may not truly understand how much of their location history is available to their friends. A 2016 study indicated that algorithms that analyze Twitter posts in tandem with Foursquare or Instagram posts can identify users’ identities with relative ease. One advantage Foursquare does have, though, is that many of its users are actually interested in having their location tracked and their data collected — users are less likely to revolt when they find that Foursquare is collecting and sharing their data.

The Foursquare app automatically provides Foursquare with the phone’s GPS coordinates any time the phone is turned on, even when the app is closed, unless the user specifically opts out of such tracking. In contrast, Facebook’s Nearby Friends feature requires users to opt in. Persistent location tracking of this sort further enhances the value of Foursquare’s location data. Foursquare claims that the services it provides are a fair trade for the data it collects; privacy experts are concerned that users cannot delete archived location data from Foursquare’s servers. Striking a balance between respecting user privacy and continuing to drive profitability will continue to be a challenge for Foursquare moving forward. Signaling a desire to meet its users’ demands for privacy, in 2016, Swarm began allowing users to check in without sharing their locations publicly; but at approximately the same time, Foursquare released its Attribution product, which mines daily location information of over 1.3 million Foursquare users who have consented to location tracking in order to determine whether or not the advertising they’ve seen has actually influenced their purchasing decisions. In July 2016, Foursquare released a digital dashboard for advertising using Attribution that lets marketers drill down into the data even further, with even more detailed audience metrics.

Please answer questions 1 through 3. This assignment should not inc...