Beanhunter Update
With only a few weeks until we celebrate Beanhunter's first birthday, we just wanted to provide a quick update about all things Beanhunter.
iPhone Application
The biggest and most recent news is that in January we launched the Beanhunter iPhone App! We think it has been a great success, and are now already up to version 1.02. We have really appreciated all of the feedback that our users have provided - rest assured that planning for Version 2 of the application is well underway, and we hope to include some really neat features (and several of those most requested)! We have also tried to be as responsive as possible when people experienced problems.
Server Upgrade
The iPhone application also had some other effects - namely the HUGE load that it placed upon our server. In the month of January (in which the application was only available for around two weeks) the Beanhunter community was rapidly growing and very busy beanhunting! In fact, compared to our normal monthly stats, we had more than 20 times the number of users join, 7 times the number of cafes added, and 6 times the number of reviews! Overall, this meant that we over doubled the number of registered users in two weeks (plus a 50% and 40% increase in cafes and reviews respectively)! As a result, last week we completed a significant upgrade in our hosting capacity to ensure that Beanhunter can meet the growing demand (February has also been busy!). This meant a few days of outages to complete the change - so we do hope that no one was inconvenienced - if so, please do accept our apologies. The upgrade will provide a great infrastructure for future and impending developments.
Beanhunter.com Version 2.0 Launching Soon
The third piece of news is that very soon we will be launching the next version of beanhunter.com. This will be a MAJOR upgrade that we are currently developing and testing. Users will be able to interact and access detailed information that hasn't been possible on the site before. We are also working to ensure that with ever-increasing levels of content, you will be able to find new cafes, reviews, and photos very easily. If you have any requests, please do let us know, because we will be rolling out Version 2.5 not long after Version 2!
So that's it for now. Thanks everyone for your feedback and patience while we completed the server change last week. We are so excited about the upcoming features and will let you know as soon as we can. We sincerely hope that you enjoy being part of the Beanhunter community - I personally LOVE reading everyone's reviews, and are continually discovering new places to find great coffee because of you. To stay informed, be sure to check out the blog, join the fan page on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter (@Beanhunter for news, @BeanhunterCafes for all the latest cafes).
Coffee soon?
Adam