Daniel Reyes
@danielr Drove out past the city to watch the day end. No feed, no notifications. Just this.
5h ago
A nonprofit social platform
Social media,
on purpose
A nonprofit platform built for intention, not attention. Everything you'd expect from a social app, some things you wouldn't, and real control over your experience.
Why TownSquare
Every decision we make answers to users, not investors.
TownSquare is a nonprofit, governed by representatives whose job is to advocate for the people who use it. There are no shareholders waiting for a return, no investors to repay. When the people making the decisions answer to you instead of to capital, the whole platform changes. Here's how.
Every one of these is something a platform built for profit couldn't offer, even if it wanted to.
01
We don't count watchtime.
Posts spread through votes, not through how long they keep you staring. The one thing every other platform optimizes for, we ignore on purpose.
02
No ads, ever.
We don't run ads and never will, and we don't sell what we know about you. A nonprofit doesn't need to mine your attention to survive, so you're never the product.
03
Creators keep more.
No shareholders taking a cut, so once it's built, more of what's earned reaches the people who make things instead of being skimmed off for profit.
04
A default that looks out for you.
Stopping points are on by default, you control how often they appear, and turning them off entirely expires after a week so the choice comes back. We're the only platform with a reason to want you to put it down.
05
An algorithm we explain, and will publish.
Every ranking rule is written out in plain language, with the actual arithmetic. The code isn't public yet. It will be, and we won't put a date on it we can't keep.
How content spreads
Posts spread on value, not on attention.
Most platforms spread whatever holds your eyes, true or not, kind or not. Here, you decide what's worth seeing. A few simple actions shape every feed, and you control all of them.
Upvote
This is worth spreading.
Press and hold for reactions, so you can signal value across the full range of feeling. A post can anger you, move you, or make you think and still be worth seeing. Every reaction counts as an upvote. Upvotes shape your For You feed.
Downvote
Show me less of this.
A private signal, never a public number, and the creator never sees it. It counts against the upvotes on a post, so it's a real weight rather than a decoration. But there's no count to watch climb, so there's nothing to brigade.
Coins
I believe in this.
Every user gets 50 free coins a day to spend on posts they think are worth it. Coins can't be bought, so nobody spends money into Trending. The harder problem is someone controlling many accounts rather than buying currency, which is why proving accounts belong to real people is a live design question for us.
Press and hold
Hold Upvote and a reaction menu rises from it.
Every reaction counts as an upvote, so you can signal value across the full range of feeling, not just a thumbs up. Comment and Share work like you'd expect.
What never counts
Comment count
A pile-on isn't reach.
A thread full of replies, even a fight, doesn't push a post any further. What matters is whether people found it worth backing, not how many turned up to argue.
Outrage
Anger doesn't travel here.
The signals that reward rage and doomscrolling on other feeds aren't part of how anything ranks here. A post gets no lift for making you angry.
For the exact ranking rules, the numbers, and what isn't settled, see how the algorithm works.
Your feeds
Three feeds. Three different jobs.
Most apps give you one feed and one algorithm deciding what you see. TownSquare gives you three, each built for a different reason, and you decide which one you're in.
For You
Discovery from honest signals, what people upvote and downvote, never watchtime. The fullscreen video format shown here is the intended launch design, not live yet.
1 Top today The whole room sang the last one
@marcusbell 200
6
@noahk60
Shipped a fix for the buggy nav bar tonight.
7@dani47
Rising Coming soon
Browse
Trending
A leaderboard ranked by coins, the community's vote of value. Smaller creators count for more, so it is not just the loudest accounts.
Rohan Patel
@rohanp Repair cafe crew took the whole afternoon off in the park. Earned it.
7h ago
Following
The people you chose, newest first. Reverse-chronological, no algorithm deciding for you. Plain on purpose.
Friends
Not a feed at all.
Our mission
A different kind of internet, on purpose
The problem was never one broken app. Big Tech didn't break the internet, it built the rules that run it: the feeds, the metrics, the incentives, all designed to serve the companies first and the people second.
Democratize The Internet is building the alternative: a nonprofit governed by the people who build and run it, accountable to the people who use it, with no shareholders to answer to. TownSquare is the first thing we've made, a social platform built to serve you, not to profit from you.
But the model is bigger than one app. The same approach can reshape how we connect, how we pay, how we gather, anywhere Big Tech has traded the public's interest for its own. TownSquare is the proof of concept, and the first of many.
Meet Democratize The Internet →Join the community
Stay in the loop
Follow the mission as it's built. Occasional updates, no spam, cancel anytime.
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