by Lionel Fumado, live @leweb blogger
The #leweb conference is already underway in Paris, bringing together more than 3,000 internet, mobile and social media professionals over three days. Here, you can find Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO, and Dennis Crowley, the founder of Foursquare, as well as many different startups.
This year’s theme is SoLoMo, for Social, Local and Mobile. One application has really stood out for me and truly exemplifies this concept. Nothing out of this world, just a simple idea that can be useful for everyone.
Leah Busque presented this iPhone application called “taskrabbit”, which many people are likely to be interested in. The idea is simple: how to find or offer work or tasks near to where you live.
The concept is focused on simple use. When I need help, whatever the reason, I can connect up and create a “task” in the application. This could be to “go shopping at the market”, “look after the dog for the evening” or even one of the most popular, “put some IKEA furniture together”! Afterwards, this task can be described by taking a photo or recording a voice message. That’s the magic of it – you don’t need to write anything at all!
In the end, the payment is made by card, but with a simple scan of the credit card. You’ve already understand the rules, simplicity, speed and no form filling at all.
Then, the community does everything with votes and recommendations, or reporting any abuse when necessary. To sum up, this application is facilitating exchanges in the physical world, not replacing them.
This video, in English, shows an example of how the application works
Can it already be used?
Unfortunately, this application is only currently working in five North American cities. An announcement has been made at #LeWeb confirming that it will be developed shortly in Europe. We hope that it comes to our cities soon. In these times of crisis, we would be glad to see anything that makes it easier for us to give one another a hand.
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