Making Connections with Dinamundo

We’re huge believers in the power of the mobile revolution to change our lives in meaningful ways. At True, we have over 15 direct app investments and 5 mobile platform investments. It’s an enormous market that is still in its nascence, and while we can all sense the raw growth of mobile device usage, we are struggling as a society to understand what immersive devices mean to the human part of our lives¹. Since the beginning of the social media revolution, skeptics have cautioned us about the potential for online time to erode real-world connections. Does screen time take away from social interactions or does it make them more accessible, more fluid, more spontaneous? One of our gaming industry founders recently wryly—but accurately—noted that the popularity of zombie genre games correlates with our now social norm of stumbling around in the real world staring into our mobile devices.

We’re surrounded and enthralled by the power of a device to bring the Internet to our pockets, and our behavior shows it: we use our devices to plug in, check in, check up, sign on, update, post, tweet, share and friend. We have unlimited information available to us at any time, and the new normal is that we not only can remain digitally connected at all times, but we also feel required to.

The Dinamundo team believes that the answer lies not in asking people to unplug, but in finding a way to use our devices to create and enhance connections in the real world. The Dinamundo iPhone app, launched last Friday in the App Store, makes real-life connections a fun, social, mobile experience, seamlessly combining the best of both worlds. Using the Dinamundo app, iPhone users can scan QR codes on each other’s phones when they get together, and with each scan, they receive a hilarious fortune written by professional comedians. The users can then share these fortunes and meetings on Facebook, and keep track of the people they meet from within the app. It’s easy, it’s free, and it may just be the thing we need to remember what social/mobile is supposed to be all about—connecting and having fun with it.

The creative power behind Dinamundo is Erik Blachford, an accomplished and seasoned CEO (Expedia, Terrapass, Butterfield & Robinson) who also sits on the boards of Zillow, Inc., Glassdoor, Bloomspot and Liftopia. I have had the great pleasure of working closely with Erik on the Bloomspot board, and his vast experience is matched by a creative vigor that we find is the hallmark of so many True founders.

We are thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Erik and his team of startup veterans who believe the world would be a better place if phones encouraged a bit more face-to-face fun. Erik and team Dinamundo, we heartily agree with you, and we’re incredibly pleased to welcome Dinamundo to the True Ventures family.

¹Watch psychologist and sociologist Sherry Turkle’s provocative TED talk on how our devices are redefining human connection and communication.