Facebook 'Local' to bring together restaurants, bars for users

Image: IANS (File Photo)

San Francisco: Facebook is reportedly relaunching its "Events" stand-alone app as "Local" for Android and iOS devices.  The application will feature information about local businesses and reviews from Facebook users. This will help in bringing together businesses, restaurants, bars and more along with events. Late on Friday, TechCrunch reported "Launching in the US on iOS and Android, Facebook "Local" combines events and permanent places to a single search engine powered by Facebook's 70 million business pages plus reviews and friends' check-ins," Aditya Koolwal, Product Manager, "Local," was quoted as saying "The new app, helps you easily find what to do, where to go, where to eat, or what you need -- all recommended by the people you know and trust,". The "Local" app will combine calendar and event listings. This combining aspect could turn the social media platform closer to apps like "Foursquare" and "Yelp" that search-and-discover and provide those results for its users locally. Facebook is also likely to start testing two features -- "red envelope" that would enable users to send money to others from the platform, and a "breaking news" tag that publishers can use to make people aware of the latest happenings around them.