A Little Rock software program engineer has created a free internet app to advertise mutual assist, the follow of sharing based mostly not on charity, however on solidarity.
Developed by Mark Barnes, MayDay is a social-networking app designed to make “real-world connections between individuals who need assistance and individuals who can present it,” based on a press launch.
Right here’s how the discharge describes the app:
MayDay offers customers the flexibility to publish gives or requests for assist and make connections between customers with comparable gives or requests. Customers can create and be a part of organizations, permitting a number of customers to publish requests or gives underneath the umbrella of that group. Customers may also create and be a part of communities, permitting them to publish gives and requests which might be solely seen to different members of that neighborhood. MayDay additionally features a map to indicate close by gives and requests in addition to a calendar the place customers can see requests and gives organized by date and time.
The app formally launches on Might 1, to coincide with Might Day, however is already stay at MayDay.community.
Barnes, who funded and created MayDay in his spare time, hopes to “enhance the visibility of mutual assist efforts,” he informed the Arkansas Instances.
“It’s the type of factor that tends to be very like phrase of mouth. And so giving a platform the place a company like, say, Central Arkansas Hurt Discount may publish and say, ‘Come to this place on today presently, and you’ll choose up some Naloxone,’ or regardless of the case could also be, that’s the objective,” Barnes stated.
MayDay is open-source, that means anybody can use, modify or share its supply code. It’s free to make use of, has no commercials and is designed to gather as little information from customers as doable. MayDay’s code is viewable on Github.
Barnes stated he’s dedicated to preserving the app “as free and accessible as doable.”
“Everyone has the potential to be in a foul place and need assistance. And all people has one thing that they’ll provide, even when that’s not like bodily labor,” Barnes stated, including {that a} request for assist might be so simple as dropping off meals for somebody who’s sick.
Barnes stated he began severely engaged on MayDay “in 2022 or 2023,” and used synthetic intelligence over the previous couple of months to get it over the end line.