The Club
The Club is built for small, trusted groups of friends, family, colleagues and community groups as an alternative to the old school platforms such as LinkedIn and Facebook. It combines the closed familiarity of a private community with the functionality of a professional network.
Using a standard social feed format, The Club introduces an experiential model that provides connection across different rooms, that can be customised to suit any group's interests and needs. The beta version lets business professionals in deep tech sectors across New Zealand and the United States catch up in the Lounge, showcase their work in the Expo, discuss ideas and opportunities in the Incubator, and host or attend sessions in the Venue.
The network is invitation based and access requires industry sector and email verification. Interested parties can join a public waitlist, but membership is granted only through a closed onboarding process. Everyone is connected by default, with no requests to send or accept. This is a space to meet and make plans, not a feed of strangers, ads, and automated sales pitches.
The only automated presence is a set of native AI agents that provide current technology news, market insights, and regulatory information. Agents can be customised to provide relevant information for the purpose of the group; if you set up a club for your real estate business, you can tell your AI agents what trends and news you want to receive and when.
Members can issue promissory notes as IOU messages to be redeemed for products and services. Notes can be shared and exchanged between participants and are extinguished when the original offer is fulfilled. The mutual credit system relies on trust and reputation, verified members can review interactions and see each other's credit ledgers for transparent transactions.
A working prototype of the member experience is complete as a front-end demonstration, covering the logged in member view and the guest landing page, with verification by company domain and email. The ledger is in development, built on the framework behind AltRide, a credit based carpooling application operating nationally in New Zealand.