Fullforesome: A social network for golfers

There are good ideas and bad ideas, of course, but this one doesn't seem to fit either category. This one seems to be a great idea, specifically one for golfers who don't necessarily have a regular (and dependable) group of players with whom they play at the same time and the same place every week.

It's called Fullforesome, a social network for golfers looking for playing partners. It was introduced in beta last August (and will be available as an iPhone app later this month) and is a free service to users (the website will be ad-driven).

The way it works is that a user books a tee time, then invites friends to join him. They can invite their closest friends first, giving them, say, eight to 24 hours to respond, then open up the invitation to the rest of their friends. If they still haven't filled the foursome, they can open it up to anyone who fits a certain set of criteria (i.e. caliber of player).

"It will enable you to cast a really wide net and ensure than when you get to the golf course you have a full foursome," Fullforesome co-founder Jim Dauer said. "The service allows golfers to easily coordinate golf plans with their own circle of friends and find others to play with."

Dauer said the system will send an email or text message notification whenever someone joins or leaves the tee time.

Another way to use the service is that the golfer can "send out a proposal to any number of his friends," Dauer said, "indicating when he's available and which courses he's interested in playing and his friends can click a couple of buttons and indicate their availability.

"Over time, we think this will change the way some people go about trying to make golf plans. For example, if I wanted to play on Saturday, instead of calling friends to see if anyone is available, I can go to Fullfoursome."

Fullforesome has spoken with the PGA of America about getting it involved in helping promote the idea. "We see this as a service that's not only good for golers, but a benefit to golf courses throughout the country," Dauer said. He cited the fact that when golf courses book a foursome, "they're relying on that person to make the effort to fill the foursome.

"Every pro in the country will tell you that one of the biggest problems they have is players who booked a foursome showing up with only one or two other players. This will cast a wide enough net to give them a better chance to get three people to join them for a round of golf."

-- John Strege