Cipher

At first, the four of us were going to create an Internet messaging app. Then we got bored and started rapping along to Childish Gambino. In the midst of our lyrical display of camaraderie, we all understood what it was that we had to dedicate this weekend to.

We were going to bring the collaboration and inspiration of crowdsourcing to freestyle rap -- to bring the gift of spittin' fire to every man, woman, and child with an iPhone. Rap can get heated. It can get hostile. But often times, it becomes an expression of oneself. Code is an expression of oneself. Do you see where I'm going with this? ;)

Our target user is anyone and everyone who needs to vent their anger at the end of the day, who needs to rejoice because of that big promotion, who needs to share their experiences and perspective, and who wants to listen to, add to, and understand someone else's verse. After all, our verses are really nothing more than short glimpses into our lives. And sharing those verses with other people, even though they might only be a few words or syllables, is immensely meaningful.

We're especially proud of our idea to provide users with short 10 second "beat bites," that our algorithm then stitches together to create an entirely new song, completely from those 10 second long verses. This brings multiple people together, taking the words of people of everywhere and urging them into unison. In the near future, we'll be implementing push notifications, so that once the song is complete and no more 10 second beat bites can fit into the song, the contributors will all receive an alert to listen to the tune that they've enriched.

We're also proud of our graphic design work. Rap shouldn't be muddled. Human experience shouldn't be cluttered. And although we might be missing a focus sometimes, there's always a clear trajectory to what we do. Our app emphasizes this through a combination of clear and blurred backgrounds, complementary colors, and big rounded buttons. We don't want our users to climb out of a hole full of confusing UI and sloppy segues. We want them to open the app, ready to share something about themselves, and come out better people for it.

Thank you for the amazing opportunity, HackSC. -The Cipher Team <3