"We are the first social network that parents want their kids to use," says Hassan Siddiq, the CEO of DailyThem.es, a writing and review platform that leverages peer-to-peer knowledge sharing and crowdsourcing to help users improve their writing skills. Siddiq is a 27 year-old Yale graduate who was born in Pakistan, grew up in Canada and Pakistan, and is currently based in the US. He is one of the three founders of DailyThem.es; the other two are an Indian and an American. The three met in college. They launched the DailyThem.es platform on October 21, 2013 as an interactive learning platform for those trying to improve their writing. Users write 100-word pieces regularly, without worrying about the nature or even quality of the content. Users are classified according to their skills, and more skilled writers are able to provide feedback to less-skilled peers. Written pieces are published under anonymous pen names, and users can like or comment, as well as provide feedback and revisions. Having worked and lived in so many countries, Siddiq and his colleagues realized that certain countries are developing their own local internet communities which are increasingly isolated from the mainstream internet, such as Twitter's Chinese clone Weibo, because of language barriers. "We decided to create a fun platform to write on, and a community that shares a passion for learning," Siddiq says, in an attempt to soften the barriers of these discrete communities. DailyThem.es claims to have users from 50+ countries, with an early client base of 1000+ users. Internet users in the Arab world are, particularly, a target audience, as many are interested in English language as a second language, and much online communication in the Arab world is in English. The DailyThem.es platform is unique, Siddiq says: "We are the first social network that promotes learning." Indeed, from a writing perspective, its nearest competitors are light blogging platforms such as Tumblr. DailyThem.es is different in its focus on the writing process, and in its providing analytical feedback tools. DailyThem.es team is looking forward to develop the platform: they are currently working on a mobile app. Siddiq promises more improvements: "We are still at early stages, we are building many features to make writing in English a fun and social activity. Stay tuned for an ever so fun writing experience."
