Apartm.net made it so if you check into their apartment on Foursquare the door unlocks. Well, not you. Them. So you can’t steal their stuff. They did it with Foursquare’s API, a custom push notification service, an industrial web-enabled relay device, some speaker wire, and knowing about electricity.
NEW YEARS PARTY
Then they realized they had solved a classic New York apartment problem: when you’re having a party, and you can’t hear the buzzer, but you don’t want to leave the door unlocked because that guy who feeds the pigeons on your corner might just decide to stop by.
Well, they had created a way to let they friends unlock their door without a key. They sent out an invite to their New Years Eve party, not knowing Foursquare Door would become a mini-internet phenomenon.
After it was written up in every major tech and NY local blog, they knew they’d have a capacity issue. They added more code and a tiny printer to the mix. When 100 people checked in or it was after 11:15pm on NYE, the tiny printer on the door told anyone who checked in to meet them down the street at a bar.
The printout was good for a free drink.
REAL WORLD TRANSMEDIA
We see Foursquare Door as another step in our ongoing research into how storytelling can be expanded into digital social and physical spaces.
