‘Tinder for politics’ App launches to help educate undecided voters

A 25-year old French-British entrepreneur has co-founded a startup focused on fighting antisemitism and helping young people become more interested in politics.

Tiger Solomons-Tibi is the chief executive of the free Pollstr App, which has garnered 1,000 users since its release on the Apple App store on 17th June.

Developed in just 12 days at a cost of £800 “because the election was called much sooner than anticipated”, Pollstr is like Tinder but instead of swiping people, users swipe political policies.

Targeted at boosting electoral turnout, Pollstr allows users to learn about politics in a fun, digestible, and interactive way.

Designed with young people in mind, especially first time voters, users view cards with policies; they swipe right if they are in favour and left if they are not. Their actions feed into an algorithm that shows users which parties they like the most. Users can also browse policies by theme and by party.

A proud member of the Jewish community, Solomons-Tibi grew up in Paris and has been living in north London for seven years. He has actively supported Jewish interests in the past as the student who succeeded in getting the IHRA (International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance) definition of antisemitism accepted as the official definition of antisemitism at UCL.

Solomons-Tibi tells Jewish News: “The goal of Pollstr is to create a legitimate platform, trustworthy to give your opinions to and not have some third party taking all of your data and selling it on to think tanks.

“We’re seeing a difference in young people who are interested in the app. They can’t connect to the politicians – it’s not their generation.”

The Pollstr App seeks to minimise the rise of extremist parties by letting its users learn about their policies. In the context of heightened antisemitism in the UK and Europe, it creates a barrier to hate by educating its users on policies rather than personalities.

Kevin El-Sayed, the app’s co-founder and chief technology officer said: “We are very proud to have launched the Pollstr App, designed to help young people stay informed and make the decisions that suit them the most on July 4th. It is paramount that young people feel connected to politics to ensure that our democracy stays afloat. This launch symbolises the start of a non-partisan youth movement that has education at its core.”

Solomons-Tibi tells Jewish News: “For the next election, however far away it might be, we want to create this legitimate platform where young people can learn about politics in a safe, trusting way. One of the big issues is that you can’t trust what politicians say. They tell half truths.

“We don’t really have a social media where you can learn in a non-partisan way. You either have Twitter which is loaded with people who say awful things, and the other platforms aren’t really made for political discourse. The future is to vote on your phone. You can vote by post, why not by phone?”

He adds: “I challenge the political parties  – if your issues are that good – tell people to use the platform and the ranking will show which party is which.” Looking ahead to the vote, he added: “I predict Labour will win with a thumping majority. Keir Starmer would have to hit someone in the street for something to go wrong at this point. The Conservatives have thrown it away.”

• Pollstr does not collect any data and is purely an education and self-polling platform. Click here to find out more.