Inspiration
In an excerpt from a blog post in the Daily Dot, Hridi Das offers her perspective on dating as an asexual. She states that "In a hetero-normative culture that is steeped with the belief that sex is a crucial part of all relationships, what were the chances of me finding someone that would understand that I don't have a sex drive?" There are as many as ten classifications for romantic orientation, and the needs of many under the age of thirty have no avenues by which they can explore their boundaries, find themselves, and find a partner.
Tinder, the dominant dating application, does not have an option for people who identify as asexual but are still seeking romantic relationships. While there are several asexual dating sites online, the site design is not appealing for a younger target market. There is also a stigma against online dating, especially for younger people. We found only one other application that served this target market but it was not up to par and we believe we could deliver a much better project. We aim to provide a place for asexual people to meet their potential partners.
What it does
The app matches potential partners with each others based on a swiping system that enables users to engage in private message conversations. Settings and profile are customizeable and inclusive.
How we built it
Cake was built with react native. We used Expo app to see our changes on our phones, and VS Live Share to code at the same time.
Challenges we ran into
As beginner coders, implementation was a difficult process. Even simple features such as radio buttons, drop-down menus, and navigation took some time to understand.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
In the span of one day, we learned how to create simple app features with react native, how to prototype and validate ideas quickly, and how to collaborate using VS Live Share.
What we learned
Sexuality is a complex spectrum; some people do not feel sexual attraction at all, others sometimes, and others still lie in a grey area in-between.
What's next for Cake
Fleshing out the user interface and allowing for a higher server capacity to hopefully one day scale up to become an app on both the android and apple store. Talking to users to get a better idea of the problem space in which we are working with, and seeking mentorship.
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