The App Store is buzzing constantly with new mobile applications for download, but one app creator thinks he’s designed something unique that will speak to college students — up to 500 at a time, to be exact.
Matt Murphy, the founder of the company Appsurdity, recently created Quad, a group-messaging app that allows up to 500 participants in a single conversation. Murphy said he designed this app with fraternities and sororities in mind because he said big groups needed a better way to communicate.
“We challenged our development team and came up with something similar to old-school forum message boards,” he said. “We took the best of that and mobilized it in real-time format on the phone.”
Murphy said although other apps like GroupMe or iMessage allow users to message multiple people, they cap out at a low number. He said features of his app would appeal to big organizations by helping facilitate polls and event announcements that can be sent to the entire group.
“I think one of the key things for clubs to achieve their missions is that they need to be organized, and communication is key,” he said. “Our mission is to empower groups. We want to be the intel inside — the communication layer — that helps groups succeed.”
Darcy Brown, 19, a UF mechanical engineering junior and the incoming vice president of public relations for Delta Delta Delta, agreed the app would be useful.
“I’d personally use this app because with all the different sources of technology in use today, it is easy to forget to check Facebook or emails,” she said. “I really like the poll feature this app has because we can immediately find out how everyone stands on a situation and can assess what we are going to do with everyone’s best interest in mind.”
John Harrison, 22, president of Kappa Sigma fraternity and a UF accounting senior, agreed Quad would be handy.
“It would be extremely useful on spreading information to people in a quick manner,” he said. “People always have their phones available, and they would receive messages immediately.”
But he said there’s a drawback — no one likes getting a flood of replies from a group thread. Harrison wouldn’t use it because receiving so many messages could be distracting.
“It would be annoying to receive hundreds of messages a day from brothers,” he said.
A version of this story ran on page 1 on 12/4/2013 under the headline "Massive group text app could help Greek groups"
