The 20 Year MVP: Blastchat
In this article I am going to explain how and why it took me 20 years to build a mobile app named Blastchat that is opened 14 times a day on average and used monthly by nearly 70% of our total user base. Both of these numbers are larger than Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. (According to former interns at Instagram)
MVP (Minimum Viable Platform) — A MVP is a software development technique in which a new platform is developed with just enough features to satisfy early adopters.
1998
In 1998, I was 10 years old and I lived in a 12 story apartment with nearly 20 units on each floor. I don’t have the official numbers but let’s assume there were 240 units and let’s also assume there was a family of three staying in each apartment. (For some context: I lived in a two bedroom apartment with eight people. But there were many elderly people who lived alone.) And of the 720 people living in this apartment building, my mother was the first one to own a personal computer.
1999
By 1999 when I turned 11 I was a heavy user of AOL chat rooms. These AOL chat rooms were the first time I was introduced to the concept of an online community. I met my first online friend, he was from Portland. ASL — remember that?
2000
I used AIM ( AOL Instant Messenger) everyday to chat with my friends in my 6th grade class.
2001
I was a heavy user of a social network for black people called Black Planet.
2004
I was 16, in the 10th grade, and I was the first one of my friends to use Myspace. I learned html and I used to design Myspace pages for friends.
2005
My friends and I used Nextel walkie talkie phones and AIM as our main sources of communication. I was also the first of many of my friends to own a T-Mobile sidekick and have an unlimited text messaging plan.
2006
I was a freshman in college and Facebook had recently been released at my my school, Monmouth University. I encouraged all of my high school friends — with access — to join Facebook. I made the first online exchange of my life on Myspace when I added someone to my Top 8 in exchange for him editing my profile pics on Myspace. He was from Canada.
2008
I deleted my Myspace account and was the first one of my friends to join Twitter. My friends and I used BBM (Blackberry Messenger) as the main communication source. Barack Obama became president. His success inspired millions of black people — including me — to go after our dreams.
2010
Facebook was the main source of communication for my friends and I. The movie “The Social Network” was released and I watched it in theatres over 20 times. I was so inspired by Mark Zuckerberg that I teamed up with a couple of friends and decided to build a startup named Socialnate. It was a platform that allowed you to exchange your personal goods for money that was then donated to charity. Think ebay but the proceeds wouldn’t go to your pockets, they would go to the charity of your choice.
2010
I was the first of my friends to download Instagram.
2011
I was the first one of my friends to download Snapchat.
2012
I took a part time job building software for my old high school. I created an ipad app that allowed teachers to send students assignments via push notifications. I also created an app that allowed the basketball team to easily scout their opponents.
2013
I enrolled in grad school at Dartmouth College to study Globalization Studies. It’s the study of different people and cultures throughout the world. I was the first one of my friends to download Vine.
2014
With the help of three friends from China, I launched my second startup called Jooke. Jooke allowed users to create traditional style jukeboxes from their mobile phones. The company ended after three months. Being that my co founders were from China, WeChat was our main source of communication.
2014
One day while at Dartmouth, I woke up wanting to play tennis. To find a partner I did these three things:
1. I started a group chat of people I thought would be interested.
2. I posted something on Facebook.
3. I posted something on Twitter.
Here were the results: My friends didn’t enjoy the random group chat because no one knew each other. And no one replied to me on Facebook and Twitter. I did some research and came across the startling statistic that less than 3% of my friends and followers saw my posts on Facebook and Twitter. I immediately thought “there had to be a way I could get one message to as many of my friends as possible and get individual responses seconds later”.
2014
My graduate thesis at Dartmouth was to study the decline of American entrepreneurship. More specifically, why Americans aren’t starting companies despite it being the easiest time in the history of our country to do so. But instead of studying why people weren’t starting companies; I decided to start building one of my own. I used the technical skills I learned from Jooke and started to build Blastchat. Blastchat is a multi purpose messaging app that allows our users to send mass messages to their most important friends, fans and customers via silent push notifications. When recipients reply they are replying to the sender and the sender only. Think BCC on email but for mobile. All blasts and chats are deleted after 24 hours to reduce our users digital footprint and to ensure a fresh and updated feed.
2015
I took an internship at Care.com in Waltham, MA where I learned a ton about building platforms, marketplaces and network effects. The money earned from the internship went into the development of Blastchat. NBA champion and All Star Kyrie Irving joined Blastchat. We were profiled by Black Enterprise:
I was recruited for Product Manager roles at Facebook and Google. I interviewed and was rejected.
2016
The Epoch Times covered me, refering to me as The Black Mark Zuckerberg:
And after several bugs and database malfunctions, Kyrie Irving leaves Blastchat. At the time our platform wasn’t ready to handle someone of his stature. We blew this opportunity but we discovered how valuable platform could become after discovering that Kyrie’s followers were 10X as active as every other Blastchat user. Sidenote: Kyrie Irving is my favorite basketball player and is a solid friend of mine. He just doesn’t like the idea. This isn’t uncommon as we had notable investors like Parker Thompson not like our idea as well. Ironically, those two have been two of the most influential people of our limited success.
I launched a Mobile Dev shop and began teaching Product Management at General Assembly. The money used went towards Blastchat development.
2017
Blastchat won a grant with the city of Newark in NJ for $50,000 to build a safety feature to help protect women and teens from domestic violence and street attacks.
2018
Blastchat is live with a few thousand users and almost 70% of users are active monthly. Users are opening our app an average of 14 times per day. There isn’t much I know about in life. But one of the few things I do know about is online communication. I’ve been communicating online with different communities for 67% of my life. I know what the golden days of online chat were like and I’m trying my best to bring it back but I need help. After 20 years of unconsciously doing market research I launched Blastchat with one goal: I wanted to build a tool that allowed me to connect with groups of people faster than any other time in human history.
We truly believe Blastchat is the future of online communication and you should definitely join if:
- You think Blastchat has the potential to be a BILLION dollar company. Blastchat is a fun and positive community. We need more supportive and positive people like you on the platform.
- You want to meet new people and build new relationships with people from all over the world.
- You are an inspiring content creator. Meaning, if you are currently trying to break through on Instagram or Twitter it will be hard being that their platforms are so large and there is so much content. On Blastchat we have a Discover section with the categories: MUSIC, CELEBS, TV/MOVIES, TECH, NEWS, ADVICE, BASKETBALL, FOOTBALL, SOCCER, GAMING, BASEBALL, MEMES, FOOD, QUICK ONLINE JOBS and more. If you have content for any of these categories you can find an audience of a few thousand on Blastchat to connect with — in real time.
- You are an influencer that wants a more genuine connection with your followers and you want to get paid for your content. Starting in 2019 or later this year, we will offer a service that will allow influencers, celebs and content creators to earn money for sharing content and interacting with fans and supporters.
- You want to tell your grandkids that you were great friends with the creator of Blastchat. If you join today, you and I will become friends or family depending on your usgae.
I spent the last 20 years of my life building Blastchat. So join us in creating a network effect that will help us fulfill our dream of becoming a billion dollar company. As each new user joins Blastchat, the overall community will become stronger so ask as many of your friends and family to join the platform as you possibly can.
Download Blastchat and let’s chat!
Jhamar
