Tether App Allows On-Campus Ratings and Messaging with Friends
“Where should I eat?” and “Which frat should I go to?” are questions that many Dartmouth students often finding themselves asking. Bryan Crampton ’17, Mike Urbach ’14 and Chris Jung ’14 have created a new app to help answer such questions. Tether allows students to rate the crowdedness of dining areas, the library and the gym and comment on the activity at fraternities and sororities. The app also shows how many of your friends are currently at these locations.
Tether overcomes the sluggishness of blitz and group messaging by allowing you to make plans with your friends on the spot. Once you “tether” your friends to a plan, they receive a notification on their phone.
Since the app’s release on May 12, the team has encouraged students to use it, which will ultimately make the app work better.
“It’s the type of project that relies on having large amounts of data and user input, and so our goal is to get more and more people using it,” Jung said. “We were hyping it up before Green Key and so far we’ve been getting a good response.”
Tether user David Harmon ’17 is also concerned by the number of current users.
“It seems like a good idea, but there's just not a lot of people on it, so there isn't a lot of usefulness yet,” he said.
Ethan Blackwood ’17 sees the potential in the app, especially in the ability to rate different locations across campus. However, some other features may not be as useful, he said, noting that the app may not replace “plain old texting” for making plans.
Tether Books, the next feature the trio plans to add to the app, will facilitate textbook exchanges by matching users based on the classes they took last term and their current courses.
“It’s usually hard for students to get a good deal when they’re selling their textbooks back,” Jung said. “But the feature will allow the student buying the book to save money and also allow the seller to make more than they would if they were to sell their book back somewhere else.”
Tether is now available for download in the app store, and you can find the app’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/dartmouth.tether