2Talk.

The internet is full of shallow chats, ghosting and endless scrolling. We wanted a place where someone listens. 2Talk paired people with ID-verified listeners for anonymous conversations, by text or voice.

It began in 2022 as Ayangku, one of 30 winning teams in East Ventures’ Indonesia PASTI BISA: Maju Terus Pantang Mundur, a coaching and hackathon programme that invested Rp7.5 billion across the 30 teams. As the idea moved from casual matching to real conversation, we renamed it 2Talk.

An app for iOS and Android. People signed in with Google or Apple, picked a topic and were matched with a verified listener. A free Whisper message broke the ice before a paid session, and voice calls were timed by the hour. Coins paid for sessions, and a moderation dashboard kept the community safe.

Social apps are a hard business. ID checks are needed for trust, but they aren’t enough. People stay for a good match, not more features. And charging in coins worked against the openness the app promised. We closed 2Talk in June 2024: the app worked, the numbers didn’t. No brief could have taught us as much.