With his recently released app, “Hedgehog,” tech entrepreneur John Matze attempts to correct some of the divisive rhetoric prominent on many social media platforms.
“The Hedgehog is a community that we’ve created for ordinary Americans to get the biggest news of the day and have quality discussion about it,” Matze told Fox News Digital.
Matze co-founded Parler in 2018, and the platform gained popularity among free speech believers before being shut down for failing to curb “hateful content.” Matze is in the midst of suing Parler for his departure, but he wanted to ensure his next venture wasn’t sabotaged by the bad actors and disruptive agents that have ruined the social media experience for many Americans.
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Hedgehog CEO John Matze said the recently released app aims to address the divisive rhetoric that is prominent on many social media platforms. (Hedgehog)
As a result, Matze has built a “very engaged and loyal community of readers” and is committed to engaging in thoughtful, respectful conversations. Hedgehogwhich is led by a social media veteran as its CEO, was quietly released for Apple and Android devices in February.
“We care about a quality experience for people. We think the quality experience you get on Hedgehog and how it’s different from other social media platforms is key to sustainable growth and is at the core of our model. Productive conversation and dialogue is something you can’t get anywhere else,” Matze said.
“On Hedgehog, the community controls everything,” he continued. “On Hedgehog, respectful conversation earns respect, and you can use that respect to decide what’s OK on the site and invite your friends and family. The more respect you earn, the more attention you get.”
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Hedgehog was released in February and is available for Android and Apple devices. (Hedgehog)
Hedgehog users can earn badges for their profile pages and status in the community by creating content that others on the platform like. Higher proven status ranks, ranging from bronze to diamond, give users more influence when it comes to community moderation.
of New York Post Recently, he described Hedgehog as a “hybrid of Flipboard, Reddit, and X.” It aggregates news from a variety of publications, including Fox News, CNN, and ESPN, providing something for everyone to enjoy in the process.
The platform aims to weed out trolls, scammers, and bad actors, giving high-ranking users more power than unproven newbies. Hedgehog’s website says that anyone is welcome on the site “except assholes,” and explains that the community can kick them out.
“Here at Hedgehog, community comes first. Opinions are respected, but where opinions are not respected, members and posters have the power to remove trolls,” the site details.
Matze is thrilled that Hedgehog has decided to prioritize serving its respectful community.
“This is a huge change compared to other social media platforms that prioritize follower counts and meaningless statistics. On Hedgehog, respect earns you the most respect,” Matze said. “If you look at the current landscape, there are a lot of companies out there that are doing what I would call wrong, so no one is doing it right.”
“Many of these companies are very centralized and very powerful, which means that one or two small decision makers are making all the important decisions about the platform themselves. This affects millions of people,” he continued. “And in my opinion, that’s having a negative impact on society.”
After struggling with his last venture, Matze took a step back to carefully consider his next venture.
“That’s how we came up with Hedgehog,” he says. “Of course, the community is in charge and there’s a place for regular people to be showcased, not just famous influencer types.”
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Hedgehog provides news from a variety of platforms. (Hedgehog)
Hedgehogs also have multiple layers of defense.
Users can pay $4.99 a month to become a “contributor,” allowing contributors to see their content on the platform to a wider audience. Matze said this cuts down on the junk that often plagues other platforms, but noted that Hedgehog also upgrades community numbers, allowing regular commenters who post daily to become contributors for free.
Hedgehog uses artificial intelligence to filter content and report potentially problematic posts to its moderation team, who have clear guidelines for deciding what is acceptable.
“If these two bills pass, they will be open to the public,” Matze said.
“If members of the public have a problem with the content, they can go ahead and flag it and then the community can use the respect score, in addition to that first layer of defense, to remove any content they want,” he explained. “The final layer is that the person who creates the post gets to decide what the conversation behind that post is, so they have a say, too. So there’s a lot of safeguards in place.”
Fox News Media’s parent company, Fox Corporation, is an investor in Hedgehog.
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