Last evening’s Tech Networking event hosted by web2newyork.com highlighted some very intriguing social networking apps that offer a little something for everyone.

AskLocal, bitehunter.com, cheek’d.com, shufflr.com are the apps that made the most noise, drawing lots of questions, and plenty of feedback from the CEOs.  AskLocal is an iPhone based app that allows the user to post on an array of topics from anywhere in the world.  Probably the sexiest map-based app I’ve seen in a while, it also allows your friends and others to follow your posts and comment on them in real-time.  Just imagine: you’ve just disembarked from a plane in London, after 6 hours in the air, after a stressful day of meetings in NYC.  You go on AskLocal and post where you’re having dinner and drinks so you can get feedback on your choices from friends or just other nosy people who are impressed that people travel like that.  I posted during the session, and immediately received responses…which was awesome.

BiteHunter.com was another interesting turn on the restaurant mapping app that allows you a new means to find new places to eat and drink.  Promising to be the “gateway to real time dining information” It also provides the user with twitter connectivity, while also giving you a button to “like” to share with your friends and anyone else.  You can review the joint, while giving a blow-by-blow review via Twitter that can be viewed by everyone.  And you can hit links to yelp.com and citysearch.com for more info, as it’s kinda light on menus.  A very special feature is the ability to pinpoint your favorite tortas or bulgogi truck, for those late night adventure when you just want something cheap from the street.  Literally, the street.

Cheek’d.com turns the world of online dating on its’ head, quite literally.  So, if you’re at  your favorite neighborhood watering hole one night, and you see a couple of attractive targets that have caught your eye, but you’re not yet sufficiently lubricated to muster the courage to say something to that special girl or guy, cheek’d.com has just the trick for you.  Before you even need to say a word, just whip out one of their cute, witty “calling cards” and hand it to your target, slip it in their purse, or pocket, and watch the game unfold…online.  When you see a card from a member of cheek’d, go to the website, register and begin to see what your romantic overture will produce.  The results of this “online dating in reverse” have been very telling.  After a favorable review of the app/website appeared in the New York Times, the response from the public has been awesome.  CEO Lori Cheek pitched the session, and inspired some of us to propose new “pickup lines” for the site.  

Finally, shufflr.com allows you to share videos you pull from the Web into a site that gives you the power to tweet in real time, while tagging videos to all of your fave endsites.  While approachable at first, the CEO wasn’t very helpful in terms of pointing out how the website changes the game.  Sure, you can tag videos with a tweet, but then what?  Wasn’t very engaged after the first few seconds. 

However, the organizer of the networking meetup, Peter Verkooijen, an online journalist expressed optimism that his approach was catching on, adding that he wanted to also produce some networking forums focused on Geo-web based apps and sites, while creating a bigger database of interested parties to attend, while securing more corporate sponsorship. 

At least I was cheek’d, and had some great finger food, so all was well in my world.

For more information, check out:

• www.shufflr.com
• www.cheekd.com
• www.bitehunter.com
• www.web2newyork.com
• www.AskLocal.com