What Is Voce? 

Democratech is developing an app that allows each of us to have a greater voice in the way our communities and our country develop. We are accomplishing this goal by developing a mobile app which allows users to vote on issues and legislation facing their communities and then comparing these polling results to the voting records of their representatives. This app is called Voce.

Why Does This Matter?

In the US, the government is “of the people, by the people, and for the people”. It is vitally important that we – the people – have a voice throughout all stages of decision making, as well as a way to hold our government accountable when our voices are ignored. By tracking constituents’ polling data versus elected officials’ voting record, we are able to present voters with solid data regarding their candidates; allowing voters to make truly informed decisions during elections. Our data will also enable elected officials to gain real-time insight into their communities in ways that campaigning and town-hall style gatherings could never achieve. With this data, officials will be able to better serve their communities.

How Does Voce Work?

Voce utilizes a hierarchal structure to present the user with polls and information relevant to their communities – initially at the state and national level, although we have plans to support communities at the local and county level as well. Voce uses a combination of geolocation data and billing address to ensure that each user is only presented with polls relevant to their community. As each account must be linked to a separate payment method, we are ensuring that our platform remains free from spam accounts created to influence public policy.

What Platforms Will Be Supported?

We plan to support both iOS and Android platforms. Depending on our funding success, Voce will be released for iOS with limited features, released for iOS with full features, or released for both iOS and Android with full features.

What Inspired Democratech?

Democratech was inspired by our founder’s desire to see our communities come together in difficult times, as well as his belief that a true democracy is a system where everyone’s voice is heard. As he watched the news and saw our nation falling into conflict, our founder began questioning what he could do to bring the power of government back to the communities which it serves. Our founder has a background in technology – he has been involved in the creation of video games for over eight years as a project manager, as well as in the role of a community advocate in several video games. With this background, the development of a digital platform was a natural development which utilizes his strengths and digital know-how.

Our Funding Campaign:

Building an app like Voce requires much more than a single developer working from his or her home office to provide the security and data integrity required to provide accurate information that is free from bias. As you may expect, this requires quite a bit of funding.

After initial research, we have determined that properly developing Voce with our planned launch features for both iOS and Android will cost $300,000.00. We believe that presenting the American people with a method of visualizing pure, unbiased data is important and so we have set our initial campaign goal at $50,000.00 which will allow us to develop the app with limited features. We will be utilizing stretch goals to develop for both iOS and Android with full features.

Why Are We Crowdfunding Rather Than Finding Larger Investors?

At Democratech, we believe in providing solid, reliable data to our users. In order to ensure that we are able to reliably provide information free from the bias of investors or other stakeholders, we have decided to rely on crowdfunding to maintain the integrity of our mission. 

The other side of crowdfunding versus investors is that by utilizing crowdfunding it allows you – our users – to come along for the journey as we work to develop our app and bring government back to you!

What Can I Do If I Can’t Donate?

We realize that not everyone is in a position to donate financially to the success of this project. If you are unable to donate to our campaign, we hope that you will advocate for our project in your local community! We have promotional materials on our website which you can print and either hand out or post in public spaces, as well as pre-formatted social media materials you can share on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! We also hope that you will share our project on platforms like SnapChat and TikTok with a link back to our project page here on Kickstarter! We hope that you will share our project regardless of whether or not you are able to financially support us! This is truly a community effort and we look forward to a successful campaign!

What Happens After Funding?

After our funding campaign has ended, we will launch our official user forum where you, our donors, will be able to preview our progress, provide feedback, and request features. We’ll be hard at work bringing Voce to life and bringing the power of government to the palm of your hand. We can’t wait to see where this journey brings us as a nation as we work tirelessly to maintain a government that is of the people, by the people, and for the people! Thank you so much for your support!

Special Requirements:

Due to the way Voce validates users using a $1 per month draw from your billing provider, we are unable to offer your first month as a free item in our rewards, however, after your initial month your free membership will begin. If you move into another district during your free access to the app after we go live, you will be required to verify your new district by paying the $1 moving cost to have your polling location changed and verified.