Foursquare Responds To Facebook Nearby By Tapping Facebook’s Friend Graph

Foursquare has made a quick response to Monday’s announcement of Facebook Nearby, with its own announcement today that Foursquare Explore is cranking up its personalization.

The irony? It’s going to use Foursquare activity from a user’s Facebook friends to improve the recommendations in Explore.

Think of it as Foursquare judo: It’s using Facebook data to battle against Facebook itself. Touché!

Here’s Foursquare’s explanation of how it’s using Facebook to turn up the personalization dial:

When your Facebook friends do public things on Foursquare, like write a tip, like a place, or take public photos, we’ll now use that to help power your recommendations when you search in Explore.

That new level of personalization happens even if the Facebook friend isn’t also a Foursquare friend. Foursquare says it’s rolling out on Foursquare.com and, more importantly, on both its iPhone and Android apps. Foursquare account holders will need to connect to their Facebook account to see more personalized recommendations.

It’s a response to Facebook Nearby, the new local search-esque feature that Facebook announced on Monday. Nearby, said by many to be a Foursquare and Yelp competitor, lets Facebook users get local business recommendations based on Facebook user activity.