1.9 Engagement

Process of a Planned agreement to do a thing , at a certain time, with someone else. And then the execution of that plan. Leads to a verified interaction

Philosophy

Products and services are meant to capture the attention of their target consumer; ideally to fulfill some need, desire, or requirement, in some way, shape, or form. So far, so good. Conventionally, social media/networking outlets measure their effectiveness in terms of engagement, with metrics such as "likes, follows, shares, pins, clicks, views, replies, re-tweets, re-blogs..." etc.

There's nothing inherently wrong with a product or service designed to capture the attention, or even the data (& metadata) of its customer base. But we are not the customer-base, we are the user-base, and we're being monetized. We're being offered a service, in exchange for becoming the product.

And let's be clear too about what optimizing that revenue stream looks like: It looks like endless hours of doom-scrolling, promoting sensationalism, perpetuating culture-wars [other bad phenomenon here]. It looks like a willingness to provide you with anything you might want provided that it never fulfills your desire. Because if those needs were satiated you'd turn away from the screen. Ultimately your satisfaction & wellbeing are barriers to that revenue stream.

As they say, "if you're not paying for it, then you're the product".

We regard engagement in the layman's sense of the word: as a clear agreement to do specified thing, at a specified place, with a known person, at a certain time. Successful engagement is not something that happens on the app, it's what happens in-real life that matters to us (hence: En Vida Real). Engagement is about people coming together so to pursue their shared interests. It starts with personal agency & informed consent, and lends to individual empowerment & community building.

Engagement in EVR is measured by people doing things together that matter to them. Our app is made as a scaffolding to enable people to connect who otherwise wouldn't. To help people meet their needs, their goals, their Ikigai, and DO something out in the world.

To hell with "eyeball hours" Engagement means something different In Real Life.

Examples

Joe spends 3 hours shit-posting on a popular micro-bloging site and draws over 20 people into an argument in the comments section -NOT a successful engagement.

Jane takes 3 minutes to find a study group to try out this Tuesday -Successful Engagement!

Doug and Lisa arrange a playdate for their dogs on Sunday -Successful Engagement!

Form and Function