In her new weekly feature, writer Mayka Mei profiles Bay Area-based fashion Web sites.
Social network newcomer Shopseen only went live publicly this winter, but it already has big plans to revive physical traffic in local boutiques.
A product of Oakland-based Proletarian Design, the concept of Shopseen came to CEO/Founder Adeel Ahmad in late 2007. Although it doesn’t seem likely that a hardware engineer would dream up the idea of a site devoted to shopping, Ahmad’s passion for photography and fashion designer wife (fellow Canada native Sarah Zins) probably had something to do with his move into social media.
Even before he got his iPhone 3G, the upswing of cameraphones and geotagging technology appealed to Ahmad for what they could potentially do for the appreciation (if not accumulation) of materialistic goods.
“Why don’t we use our phones to be a kind of citizen fashion reporter?” he asked. The capability was there, Ahmad just had to build it.
Customer crowdsourcing: Users vote on new product and event finds that they share amongst themselves.