LocalsOnly
A chill, warm iOS app where verified San Diego locals share trusted food and drink ratings, build a personal taste portfolio, and get explainable recommendations from like-minded locals.
What it is
LocalsOnly is a verified-locals-only food and drink app. Item-level ratings (think: every matcha, every old fashioned, every classic burger) build into a personal taste portfolio and into community leaderboards by item type, ranked with a confidence-weighted score that resists manipulation.
What makes it different
- Verified locals only. Posting unlocks after a lightweight local-verification flow, so reviews come from people with real ground-truth in the neighborhood.
- Item-level, not just venue-level. A 9.1 on a specific dish or drink is far more useful than a 4-star average for an entire restaurant.
- Explainable recommendations. Suggestions arrive with their reasoning ("Because you rated A, B, and C highly, similar locals rated this 9.1") and are gated by overlap and confidence.
- Trust-by-design. No pay-to-rank, no business control over user ratings, no suppression of negative reviews. Monetization, when it arrives, is technically isolated from ranking.
MVP scope
- Local verification onboarding.
- Item-level ratings on a 1.0-10.0 scale in 0.1 steps.
- Personal taste portfolio with item-type filters.
- Community leaderboards using weighted-confidence ranking.
- Explainable recommendations from similar raters.
- Spot reviews, updates, comments, and reactions.
- Photo upload for ratings and reviews.
- Public profile page with avatar.
Launch market
San Diego first. Geographic focus is a feature, not a limitation: trustworthy local recommendations require a real local community, and a single-city launch lets us tune verification friction and ranking quality before expanding.
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