Meet your political soulmate with this Wharton startup’s #DNC2016 game

Looking for your political soulmate amid a sea of Democrats? How ’bout your political enemy?
Twine, a startup founded by a pair of Wharton MBAs, wants to hook you up. Take their survey and they’ll connect you with the three people who are most and least like you, politically. (And a random group of participants will win a boatload of cheesesteaks, because Philly.)
Take the survey
“We’ve taken inspiration from Airbnb’s 2008 DNC publicity stunt,” said Twine cofounder Joseph Quan.
He’s talking about how Airbnb recognized the shortage of hotel rooms in Denver and turned it into a business opportunity for the then-fledgling startup. He hopes Twine, which he bills as “a way to serendipitously discover people with similar interests,” can ride the wave of the Democratic National Convention.
Twine, which is based out of the Wharton MBA incubator space at 2401 Walnut, normally sells its product to institutions and enterprises however, this time they thought it’d be interesting to drive a completely consumer-based initiative in the public domain.
The survey takes the information that people have provided about themselves and matches them up through Twine’s matching algorithms and introduces them to one another. Quan said that this won’t be their ultimate platform — it’s just a fun way to use it for the DNC.
One question on the survey asks, “What’s the issue you’re most passionate about this election season?”
Quan believes this question helps connect people on a more intellectual note.
“We want people to have real substantive conversations about this especially if they’re already aligned mentally or politically or even if they’re very opposed politically, we just thought that it’d be an interesting experiment,” he said.
Match away.