AirRun App for iPhones Enables Peer-to-Peer Commerce

In a world where there’s an app for everything and anything, one of the most interesting is AirRun, a brand new iPhone app that allows its users to have strangers run errands for them.

Intrigued? AirRun enables peer-to-peer (P2P) commerce or "crowd commerce" as it is sometimes called. Essentially, “Seekers” are people who are seeking somebody to do something, and offer a price for the request. “Runners” are those that make money by running errands or doing similar chores for the “Seekers.”

The founders of AirRun believe that P2P commerce is a small way to alleviate unemployment by giving people relatively simple jobs for quick money. “It’s early days for P2P commerce, but there's huge potential for this new way of doing business and for AirRun's location-based community job hub,” AirRun has said.

To enable localized commerce between individuals, the service uses the advanced geolocation features of the iPhone. An AirRun request is sent out and as soon as a “Seeker” selects a Runner. Runners are rated by Seekers so over time the best and most reliable Runners will be well known to Seekers.

Just a few of the AirRun requests that have come through the app are Personal Assistant for the day; Flowers for my wife; and, Come to Our Office and Sing Happy Birthday to Kim.

With the service just transitioning from an early beta program to being up and running, the trick for AirRun now is to get a critical mass of local Seekers and Runners. Obviously, the first Runner in a given area who signs up might not see any Seekers online. The first Seeker to post a request might not get a response from any Runners.