What We’re About

Hey there,

We’re strange. We’re also strangers. And we’d like to get to know you.

Explain

It’s hard to deny that, with the rise of the internet, we’ve become exposed to people who are radically different than ourselves. Different interests, different backgrounds, different beliefs, and so much more. For some of us, that’s fascinating. For others, it’s terrifying. For most of us, if we’re honest, it’s usually a bit of both.

Unfortunately, much of modern media is motivated to amplify the “terrifying” aspect because it generates more clicks, more ads, more addiction. And the more that happens, the more we come to equate strangeness, or “otherness,” with fear and aversion.

As those fears and aversions have grown, much has turned into anger and hatred, which only furthers the cycle as we see “others” (who have been just as provoked and incited as we have) descend into violence, further “proving” our beliefs that those others are in fact dangerous and deserve our fear and anger.

It’s Time For a Change

We want to turn that cycle around. We want to get to know you, in all your strangeness, and we want to make our strangeness known as well. Because once we can begin to know and understand others in their own strangeness, we will find there’s so much less to fear.

In light of that, we’re creating a new platform: Connect With Strangers. Its entire purpose is to connect you with people who are different than you. These differences could be matters of race, politics, religion, sexual orientation, economic status, or anything else. Once we’ve connected you, all we ask is that you seek first to listen and to understand, rather than to “correct” or “educate.”

How Does It Work?

Create your profile

To get started, you’ll first create your profile. For convenience, you can import most of your information from Facebook, but don’t worry, we don’t store any of your Facebook info beyond this first import (we’re big on data privacy, and will be writing about it extensively here). This profile tells us both who you are (race, country, gender, etc) as well as what you believe (political and religious beliefs, values, and interests).

Once we have that profile, you’ll have a chance to tell us who you want to talk to and why. Perhaps there’s a specific issue or viewpoint you struggle to understand and you’d like to explore it with someone who lives it daily. Or perhaps there’s a topic or two that you love and are eager to discuss with others who share your interests but come from different backgrounds or perspectives. Whatever your interest, tell us who you are and what brings you here and we’ll do the rest to find someone who meets those aims.

Reviewing Matches

Once we’ve found a match, you’ll each receive an email with a brief summary of your potential match, including their first name and a few of your similarities and differences. Note, your full profile will never be shared with anyone unless you explicitly choose to do so (see the “Reveal” section below for more information). In addition, while we generate the summary information dynamically based on what you’re each looking for in your match, you can mark any profile attribute as private and we’ll exclude it from all summaries.

If for any reason you’d prefer not to connect with your match, you’re welcome to decline, though CWS’ entire purpose is to encourage you to step out of your usual circles and meet people you might otherwise not connect with, so we do highly recommend that you accept at least the first few matches to get a feel for it. And if at any point during the ensuing conversation you become uncomfortable or disinterested, you can always close it out and you won’t get any more messages from that match ever again.

CONNECT!

When you do both accept the match, however, you’ll be connected within our messaging system to begin chatting. We’ll provide some starter questions and topics, but feel free to ignore those and kick off the conversation however you see fit. Remember, the whole point is to get to know and understand people with different backgrounds and beliefs, so be honest about yourself, but also honestly listen to who they are and what they believe. Ask questions, don’t be afraid to admit what you don’t know, and don’t be surprised when they aren’t familiar with something you take for granted.

The first few connections you make, we’ll ask you to explicitly agree to the guidelines above, just as a reminder. And if at any point you feel like your match isn’t adhering to them, you’ll be able to flag them for us to review. That said, remember this is likely just as strange for them at first, so try politely reminding them of the guidelines if you’re willing, and don’t be surprised if we ask if you’ve done that when you first flag someone.

Reveal

If all goes well, however, you’ll start to connect and come to understand one another better and, eventually, you may want to reveal your whole profile to each other. Either party may initiate this process, but both people must agree to it before anything is shared. Once revealed, you’ll be able to see your match’s entire profile and will gain a whole new range of topics to learn and explore.

Serve (coming later)

At CWS, we believe conversation is vital to understanding each other, but we also believe that that’s only the start of a true connection. As such, in addition to our messaging platform, we’re partnering with local non-profits to provide opportunities for you to work alongside your matches to serve your communities.

While we certainly hope you’ll also take time to do other things in person and welcome each other into your circles, we believe that working together to accomplish something for others is one of the best ways to highlight your commonalities while also showcasing the value of your differences.

We don’t have any specifics for this just yet, but if you have any suggestions on how we can make it amazing or if you know of a good non-profit or charity that would be a good fit, reach out to us via the chat widget at the bottom right of the screen, we’d love to talk with you!

Interested?

We’re aiming to release our first beta in mid-June 2019, but if you’d like to be a part of the journey, or even if you just want to follow our progress, sign up at our website and subscribe to us here for more details.

And, if you’d like to help us create this platform in the first place, email us at connect@withstrangers.io and tell us your vision.