KickOn is an app (iOS)?to find parties near you and request an invite to join the party. Empower your social life and discover private, exclusive parties and events around you.
Sydney investment banker and tech entrepreneur Charles Stewart launched KickOn, a new app they?re calling ?Tinder for parties?. The app ? which is free to download and use but will have premium levels introduced in six months ? is designed as the solution to Sydney?s lockout laws, Stewart said in the press release.
?Responsible adults who like to party are being short-changed by nanny state laws, forced to go home at a time when in many other global cities, the party is just getting started,? Stewart said. ?I created KickOn because I knew there had to be a better way.? In the app, users create a personal profile and can make their own KickOn events and invite friends or strangers, veted by their profiles, or ask for invites to other parties; both host and attendees are rated on their party behaviour.
But by today, the backlash had already started. An article in the Sydney Morning Herald warned that the app could be used by underage teens to coordinate ?Corey Worthington on steroids? house parties, while the NSW Police Association president Scott Weber said that police would likely monitor the app and use it to shut down parties. We got in touch with KickOn founder Charles Stewart to find out what they thought about police prowling KickOn, and users organising orgies with the app.
What do you think of the concerns expressed in the SMH that KickOn could be used to create underage parties ?fraught with danger??
?They?ve taken a very conservative view ? ultimately what we?re trying to do is make private, exclusive parties discoverable. There?s no reason why, if you?re organising a party, a 17 year-old can?t be matched with a 19 year-old, especially if the party isn?t promoting drinking or any other more nefarious activities. We think KickOn could be used to organise a game of touch footy down at the park, so why shouldn?t a 13 year-old be matched with a 23 year-old??
Are there policies in place to stop people from creating events that might be based around such ?nefarious activities??
?We have the ability to report any inappropriate content ? if someone posts a lewd photo, for example ? and you can report inappropriate content when you?re at an event. So we do have some systems in place, and we intend to refine those over time.?
What do you think about the NSW Police Association president saying that the police might use KickOn to find and shut down parties?
?That is 100% not its intended use ? it?s actually quite surprising, the comments from police. Usually when the police come out and say something bad about something, like ?don?t jump?, millennials? response is ?how high?? Usually it?s a great way to get publicity, so we?re not hating the fact that they?ve actually done that. Ultimately we have systems in KickOn that allow you to control party invites better than Facebook events, so we?re hoping ? we?ve tried to get in touch with police ? that when we do they?ll see that it?s a safer way to organise parties.?
Have you considered the possibility of being sued, in the way that AirBNB was sued by a user in New York whose flat was used for an orgy?
?Yes, we have, in quite a lot of detail. On the side, we may even see that KickOn is used to organise orgies, we?re not even 100% sure what the final usage will be. But we have terms and conditions, and a privacy policy, in place that stipulates that KickOn is a technology platform that allows you to set up and discover private events around you. The way that attendees end up behaving themselves is ultimately up to the users? control.?
I?m guessing you?ve used the app to create your own KickOn parties and invite randoms ? how did you find the experience?
?I hosted a KickOn KickOff party at my place in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney on Saturday night, and invited 80 of my mates along and 60 matches from KickOn, after I?d vetted their profiles based on their reputation, and 30 of them came along. The best response was out of the 30 random people who came along, because they got to make friends with 80 new people, and we ended up kicking on until six in the morning.?
Sources: TheNewDaily, IntheMix, ToneDeaf, 3News