Wildfire

Go Bears!

Thanks for hunting us @ninarstepanov! @vinaytion, @jpatel and I are excited to be on Product Hunt today! Wildfire is the front page of the 5 miles around you. It’s a hyperlocal news app where users post about major events (from safety to a celebrity sighting) to notify the people right around them instantly. I had the idea for Wildfire after I was nearly mugged outside a library on UC Berkeley’s campus last year. I made a Facebook post to warn students, which got hundreds of views, but quickly realized that Berkeley has thousands of students who either weren’t friends with me on Facebook or scrolling through their newsfeed at that moment. We built Wildfire as a much more effective way to communicate with the people right around you in real-time. Users post about many categories from campus safety to parties and events to celebrity sightings. You select the categories you want to receive notifications for! Here are some use cases of Wildfire: • ⚠️ Safety: Wildfire alerted 4,000 Berkeley students within a 1 mile radius of a shooting, a minute after it happened (and grew by 2,000 users in the following hour). • 😎 Celebrity Sighting: 11,000 students instantly found out that Kevin Durant (Golden State Warriors) was on campus. • 📢 Protest: A Neo Nazi protest in Raleigh last week broke on Wildfire before any other social media platform. Students were posting pictures, videos and discussing the event in real-time. 🔥 Wildfire is rapidly expanding to more college campuses and cities, and we’d love to hear the your feedback! Feel free to ask us any questions about how Wildfire works, or suggest colleges & cities you’d like us to bring Wildfire to next!

Hyper-localized social networks are vital for the sustainability of communities in a globalized digital world. No one has cracked a truly valuable news/information app that's based upon a very specific location, so go crush it...

This is awesome!!! What are some of your favorite pieces of user-generated news that were shared on Wildfire? 🔥🔥🔥

Cool idea. I would make the flame itself the pin (and ditch the pin that's surrounding it). It would simplify your logo. Let me know if you want our assistance with that.

Providing a "Waze for.." is spot on for campus settings. Everyone is connected and they need to know where KD is or safety situations are. This could also be used for deals at bookstores and such. Well done!

If you're reading this it's too late.

Pros:

- Gives me real-time local news that's relevant and important

- Makes me feel safe and more aware of what's happening in my neighborhood

Cons:

- Not everyone has the app yet