Have you ever discovered a really great place and wanted to tell all your friends about it right away? Well, now you can do that with your iPhone or iPod Touch by downloading the free “Stamped” app from the App Store.
Featured as one of the hottest free apps by Apple and also as one of Mashable’s 15 Best Mobile apps of 2011, Stamped is a must-have app for the iPhone user who absolutely loves social media sharing and can’t get enough of it.
What Is Stamped?
Stamped lets you recommend the things you like best to your friends. Whether it’s a restaurant, a book, a movie, a song or anything else—you can use Stamped to tell everyone about what you really love.
“Stamping” a favorite place or thing can be shared with your friends on other social networks like Facebook or Twitter. Your stamps can help start conversations and inspire your friends to try new things that you think they might really enjoy.
Why Use Stamped?
When you want to find a new restaurant to try or a new book to read, the average person might do a Google search to find ratings and real user reviews. On the other hand, when a friend or family member you trust has already personally recommended a new place or thing to try out, you may be more likely to trust those recommendations rather than the recommendations from strangers.
Put simply, people trust their friends, so they also put more trust in the recommendations their friends make. Stamped allows you to create your very own personal recommendation guide for your friends to use. Likewise, your friends can do the same to help you discover great new things and places as well.
How Is Stamped Different From Other Social Apps?
Stamped is a lot like Foursquare and GetGlue. Foursquare lets your friends know what venues you’ve checked in to and GetGlue tells your friends what kind of entertainment you’re currently enjoying. Stamped lets you do all the things that Foursquare and GetGlue lets you do, with the exception of encouraging you to only place stamps on things that are really worth telling people about. Essentially, a “stamp” is a five-star recommendation.
Similar apps like Foursquare and GetGlue require users to check in to anything and everything in order to earn “badges” or “stickers.” So, even if a particular user is watching a bland show or visiting an uninteresting venue like Wal-Mart, those users are still encouraged to check in so they can earn rewards. This can create a lot of noise and irrelevant shared updates.
Stamped isn’t about creating meaningless noise. You are only encouraged to stamp things or places that you think deserve a five-star rating. Instead of becoming a check-in junkie like Foursquare and GetGlue wants you to become, Stamped only wants you to share the things that are really important and worth talking about.
Stamped App Features
At this point, the only way to access the Stamped platform is through the iPhone or iPod Touch. There is currently no web platform or Android app, although the developers of Stamped hope to release a version for Android in the future.
Here are some of the main features you get when you start using Stamped:
100 stamps to start: You can only stamp up to 100 things or places first. To earn more stamps, your friends have to like and engage with you on the things that you stamped.
Credit: You can give something called a credit to a friend by thanking them for stamping and recommending something to you. That way, your friends can earn more stamps. If your friends offer you credits, you also gain the ability to earn more stamps.
Search: Simply use the search function to search for the name of a favorite restaurant, book, movie or anything else. Once it's found, you can stamp it to make your recommendation.
Customizable stamp colors: When you initially create your account, you can choose a specific color for your personal stamps. Some may choose to make their stamps appear to be red, while others may want them to be blue.
List of stamps: Choose the "Stamps" button on the bottom of your iPhone screen to view all the things you stamped. You can also delete stamped items if you change your mind or run out of stamps too quickly.
News: The "News" button displays all your comments, likes, mentions, credits, to-do's and other information relevant to your stamping activity.
To-Do: The "To-Do" button allows you to search for things and put them on your to-do list, like visiting a new venue or buying a new book. You don't necessarily need to stamp these things.
People: The "People" button displays all your friends that are on Stamped. You can add more people by connecting your Stamped account with Facebook or Twitter to find people already on Stamped who are already connected to your social circle.
How to Get Started with Stamped
If you own an iPhone or an iPod Touch, all you need to do is visit the App Store and search for “Stamped.” Once you’ve downloaded the free app, you’ll be required to create an account. You will be required to fill out your full name, a username, a valid email address, a password and you can upload an optional profile picture.
Stamped will then guide you through the rest of the steps, which includes choosing your stamp color, adding friends and connecting your Stamped account to Facebook and Twitter. Once that’s all done, you can start stamping anything you want.
