SoSa
SoSa started as Social Savanna and was originally built for the Imgur community in 2013 / 2014 where they would escape the 140-character limit and make new friends and socialize online.
I designed it in public, sharing mockups and ideas on Imgur for feedback. It launched in February 2014 and 15,000 people signed up in the first 24 hours.
I paused it in 2018 when we had just over 100,000 members. I tried to start again during COVID but unfortunately my health needed my attention which led me to build Bearly Fit.
What it was meant to be
It should be easy to socialise
From registration, I want it to take less than a minute for someone to get involved in the community and chatting with other people.
Socialising should be easy
Anxiety, confidence and other issues can become hurdles to making new friends and socialising. I want to try and tackle these by providing fun, simple ways of getting conversations started.
Friendship must be accessible
Accessibility also shouldn't be a hurdle to making new friends and I want SoSa to be as available and accessible to people as possible.
Users must have full control of their privacy
Conversations can get out of hand, users should be able to control what they want to see and what others see about them.
Advertising must be privacy friendly
Advertising will only be served from our own platform, not a third party.
Socialising should be free
SoSa will be free, you will not need to grind or pay money for a great experience.
Social Good
I want the platform / app to use people's engagement as an incentive for charity drives, donations and doing things like planting trees.