FAQs

What's the inspiration behind Junto?

Junto was created to facilitate a more open era of human connection. We want to harness technology's potential to empower rich self-expression, grassroots movements, and meaningful collaboration.

How do you pronounce Junto?

Our team pronounces it “june-toe,” but you can pronounce it however you want!

Who is Junto for?

Everyone! We welcome all walks of life. That said, for Junto to be a safe and healthy place, we ask that folks read, understand, and practice our three basic community agreements.

How are you addressing privacy concerns with data?

We do not own, track, or sell your data. We are also a nonprofit and have no incentive to do so. Your best interest is our best interest.

What does distributed technology mean and what value does it have?

In short, decentralized technology cuts out the need for the middle-man. Today, most web traffic passes through corporate web servers and in the case of social media, this puts corporations in between our interactions. As a result, they have a license to track and sell our data. Their centralized nature is also more prone to hacks and censorship. Built on decentralized technology, Junto is more secure than its centralized counterparts. It is more resilient to censorship and provides its members with ownership of their information. In short, we are unable to track or sell your data even if we wanted to.

What kind of decentralized technology are you using?

We intend to build Junto on Holochain, a biomimicry-inspired framework to build distributed applications. Learn more about the technology at holochain.org

As of Q4 2020, Junto is running on a centralized graph database that can be switched to Holochain when it is production ready. We are beginning to work towards building our a direct messaging feature on Holochain first.

How are you funding this project?

In the first two months of 2019, we raised over $110K from 773 people via crowdfunding campaigns. In April 2019, we raised an additional $75K from mission-aligned supporters and advisors. We are beginning our grassroots funding model in the final months of 2020 and we plan to raise another $500K in large donations and bridge loans in Q1 2021.

How can I help?

Check out our page on contributing to learn about all the ways you can support Junto.