Experience life with a stranger
Tworlds is a simple app that lets you know who is doing the exact same thing as you are at that very moment.
Everyone, at some point in their life, has wondered if there is anyone else out there who is doing the exact same thing as them at the exact same moment.
This thought used to be romantic before social media came along and gave us phone-sized windows into the lives of other people. But these glimpses are curated according to who you know, the moments they have picked out to share with you, and when they choose to share them. One day, Dutch designer Antoine Peter was staring out of the window when the same question floated through his mind. His train of thought led him to build an app that would answer the question in the most literal sense possible. He founded a local group of developers, Noodlewerk, to build it and had his girlfriend design some pretty sweet black and white graphics.
Tworlds is a simple app. All you have to do is log in and let the app know your location. The app will only want you location information to the level of city. You will then have to choose from the 20- odd subject prompts. Suppose you select “#rainbow”. Then, you click a picture of whatever you want (it could an actual rainbow or just a drawing) and the app will share the photo immediately with someone else who, right at that moment, is doing something #rainbow. You will also get a picture of that person and you will have a moment frozen in time!
In practice, the app is nothing extraordinary. But, that looks like a part of its appeal. Some of the monotony is by design as the app does not offer filters and other photo editing tools that usually prep things up. But, it is reflective of everyday life. It has similarities to Snapchat, and even Chatroulette. It works on the spontaneity that makes the corner of the Internet so addictive.
This article was first published on The Hindu and is available at http://www.thehindu.com/features/metroplus/tworlds-a-simple-smartphone-application/article7370795.ece