A project in service of a bigger us
We're more alike than
the news lets on.
person·af puts you face-to-face with one real person who sees the world differently — and opens the conversation on what you share, not where you split.
18+ · moderated · your face makes an account, never a photo we keep · nothing recorded — optional live captions translate in the moment, then vanish
Division is real. So is the cure.
The wall
Diverse, low-trust societies tend to "hunker down" — people pull back and trust even their own group less, which quietly erodes the willingness to build anything in common. That's the wall every shared project eventually hits.
The door
But the same research found the door. Real contact between groups, under the right conditions, reliably reduces prejudice. And when people recategorize from "us and them" into a bigger "us" — without being asked to stop being themselves — the animosity drops. person·af is built to open that door, on purpose.
How it works
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1
A quick face check
A one-time scan creates your account so people who've been banned can't just come back. We store an irreversible faceprint — never your photo — and it's also how you log in from any device.
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2
A few honest questions
Answer a handful of stance questions (or skip them). There are no right answers, and your answers stay anonymous — they're never stored, just used to pair you.
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3
Meet someone different
You're paired with a real person who sees things differently from you — across the divide, not inside your bubble. That difference is the whole point.
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4
Start on common ground
Your icebreaker opens on something you agree on. If you want, it'll point you to where you differ — as an invitation to trade a story, not a debate. You don't have to change your mind to get where the other person is coming from.
Built on evidence, not vibes
Every design choice traces to the research on how strangers actually bridge a divide.
Contact, done right
A meta-analysis of 500+ studies across 38 nations found that intergroup contact, under the right conditions, reliably reduces prejudice. So we don't just expose you to conflict — we set the conditions.
Lead with common identity
A 2024 Science megastudy of 32,000+ Americans found the strongest lever against animosity is highlighting a shared identity — so the conversation opens there, not on the fight.
You're still you
A bigger "us" works best when nobody's asked to erase the smaller one. Disagree freely — the goal is a mirror, not a verdict. Nobody gets excommunicated.
An honest limit, kept on purpose: warming feelings between two strangers isn't the same as fixing everything downstream. This builds connection across difference. It doesn't promise paradise — just something demonstrably better than shouting past each other.
Safe enough to be worth it
Connecting strangers over live video only works if the space is safe. So it's built in.
Report & block, instantly
One tap moves you on and blocks that person for good.
AI + human moderation
Reports are reviewed automatically; the genuine edge cases reach a human.
Adults only
18+, with a hard line and immediate escalation on anything involving a minor.
Bans that stick
Identity is tied to your faceprint, so banned users can't spin up a new account.
Your views stay yours
Your answers are anonymous and never stored. Conversations aren't recorded — optional live captions, translation, and smart prompts process speech in the moment (only if you turn them on) and are never kept.
Privacy by design
We keep an irreversible faceprint for anti-abuse — never your photo.
The argument behind person·af
A floor, not a ceiling
person·af isn't only an app. It's the "solidarity spine" of A Floor, Not a Ceiling — an evidence-based framework for a country that doesn't let anyone fall below a basic floor. Nobody caps how high you climb; we just refuse to let anyone fall through. And every plank of that argument depends on first building a bigger "us." That's the part this app does.
Three roads, one destination
Three moral traditions that usually argue all walk to the same floor.
Freedom
"Necessitous men are not free." A person who can't eat without obeying isn't free — so the floor follows. — Roosevelt, 1944
Fairness
Design society from behind a veil of ignorance, not knowing who you'll be born as. Nobody picks a world without a floor. — Rawls
Merit
Even if you should get what you earn — almost nobody earned their starting line: their parents, country, era, native wits.
The eleven planks
One argument, built from eleven parts — each with its costs named.
- The moral premise. A floor of basic dignity nobody falls below.
- Solidarity. Deliberately build a bigger "us." The load-bearing bet.
- Education. Standardize on what works; keep contested values plural.
- Health. Universal coverage is the floor; the mechanism is a choice.
- Immigration. Ordered openness — real gains, real order.
- Paying for it. You can't tax the rich alone; a real floor needs broad taxes.
- Transition. Change by consent and demonstration, never by force.
- Housing. A shortage we zoned into being — and can build our way out of.
- The income floor. A child allowance that cut child poverty nearly in half.
- Work & ownership. Change who owns the machine; don't moralize about greed.
- And eventually the world. Humble universalism — show it works, let it spread.
The honest core, stated once: this is a bet on solidarity, and every plank keeps its costs and failure modes on the page. Nothing here promises paradise — only something demonstrably, robustly better than what we have.
Ready to meet someone?
One real person. One honest conversation. Start where you agree.
Enter the app →