Toka (2015): A Chatroom's Response to Facebook

Toka is a chatroom-based community.

It is based on the following 3 principles: 1.) With 2 billion people connected to the Internet, meeting people online with similar interests should totally be easier 2.) The social taboo against making friends online is outdated 3.) Chatrooms allow people to connect with others in a way that’s not possible through content-driven sites like Facebook or Twitter.

Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit are driven mostly by user-generated content. Users post things like statuses, photos, and comments – social interaction is then derived from this activity.

However, we think that there is too much emphasis on content rather than on the social interaction behind it. A karma system encourages this – the “like” or “upvote” functions have effectively turned the act of posting into a popularity contest, since the people who accrue the most amount of likes or upvotes are the ones deemed as popular. This leaves little room for actually building relationships.

So what does it mean to be “social” on the internet? Is being social on the internet even a desirable thing? We think that being social on the internet means exactly the same as it’d mean in real life – making new friends and keeping up with the friends you already have. Over time, you might drift apart from some friends, or you might grow closer to others. But considering how many people are on the internet now, it’s crazy that there isn’t a system to make the social process easier.

I pretty much copy+pasted from my journal, let me know what you think - and I appreciate you asking! I'm just trying to grow the userbase to a point where it's useful.