Votespot: the poor man’s Localmind

Apps that let you ask a question about a place are becoming more common. Localmind and Quora are the two leaders here. But what if you want to ask a question and have other users vote on the answer? You use a new iPhone app called Votespot.

With Votespot, you pick a nearby spot from foursquare’s database and ask a question. Other Votespot users can then vote on an answer — either yes or no.

With the app, you can browse nearby spots to see the questions that have been left there, and answer any you’d like to vote on. Your votes can include comments and photos. The votes are presented with nicely designed graphs.

Votespot’s biggest weakness is its yes/no answer limitation. It’s hard to get any useful insight when you have to frame your question for one of those two answers. Even a simple “Which is better, the burger or the shrimp?” is out of the question. Adding multiple choices would make the app much more useful for the majority of people.

You can share your “votespots” with your friends on Facebook and Twitter, but they’ll only be able to see the current vote. There’s no way for them to vote without downloading the app and browsing to the venue you’ve added a vote to. You’re left to hope someone nearby stumbles across your question and votes before you’ll see any answers.

The developers say more new features are coming soon, so hopefully they’ll be addressing these weaknesses. As it stands, I’ll stick to Localmind when I have a question about some place I want to go.