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Attendees of the past weekend's New York City inaugural Escape Music Festival were some of the first to experience the debut of location-based photo streaming and sharing service Terranova.
The self-described “mobile personal assistant” aggregates current information for users seeking to learn about local events and now allows them to take photos or film short videos and share them instantly with other users in their vicinity, as well as their social media followers.
"With Terranova, festivalgoers can easily share their most memorable and immersive experiences with those around them, as well as their social media networks around the world," said Escape founder Merritt Quirk in a statement.
Once a user takes a photo or video, the app automatically creates a geo-tagged “beacon” accessible to nearby users, as well as the original poster’s connections on Facebook and Twitter. Every beacon is mapped and incorporated into a “real-time” feed built on algorithms that prioritize content deemed relevant to the user, à la Instagram.
Terranova was founded in Chicago in 2012 by George Stoikos and Andy Stankiewicz as a means for users to share and discover what's happening around them (such as concerts or yoga classes). The platform uses algorithms built to collect "real-time" information, rather than following the Siri or Google Now model of searching the static Web.
By December 2012, the company raised $1.05 million in seed funding, launching a private beta app for iOS, Android, and desktop in early 2013. In February of this year, the startup was named an Interactive 2014 Accelerator finalist at Austin’s annual South by Southwest festival for its search technology.
The app is available for free in the Apple Store and on Google Play.
