Particle.news
Download on the App Store
6 ARTICLES
·
7h ago

Startup Links SF and Texas Pay Phones to Spur Cross-Party Conversations

The project serves as emotional-fitness research by Matter Neuroscience that records calls for curated sharing.

Joshua Cristantiello, right, and Mason Hunt, wait for someone from Texas to answer a phone call to engage in a political conversation, on Valencia Street in San Francisco over the holiday weekend. Matter Neuroscience, a tech company focusing on understanding and boosting happiness, set up a phone as an experiment for passersby in San Francisco to talk with residents from Abilene, Texas.
Joshua Cristantiello, right, and Mason Hunt, wait for someone from Texas to answer a phone call to engage in a political conversation, on Valencia Street in San Francisco over the weekend. 
A pay phone set up by Matter Neuroscience, a tech company focusing on understanding and boosting happiness, as an experiment for passersby in San Francisco to talk with residents in Abilene, Texas, sits outside a tattoo shop on Valencia Street in San Francisco, over the holiday weekend.
A pay phone set up by Matter Neuroscience, a tech company focusing on understanding and boosting happiness, as an experiment for passersby in San Francisco to talk with residents in Abilene, Texas, sits outside a tattoo shop on Valencia Street in San Francisco over the weekend.

Overview

  • A red phone outside Black Serum Tattoo in San Francisco connects directly to a blue phone at Seven and One Books in Abilene, labeled respectively to invite talking to a Republican or a Democrat.
  • The line went live over the weekend with short, largely civil exchanges that reporters and organizers described as friendly.
  • Organizers are recording conversations and say they plan to post selected positive clips on social media starting as soon as next week.
  • The installation is slated to run for roughly 30 days through February as the team assesses results and considers adding phones in other cities.
  • The devices are repurposed pay phones fitted with a modem and SIM card, and the effort comes from a venture-backed startup researching measurable indicators of happiness.