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Armenian Entrepreneur Builds the
Product of All Experiences
“I was the pedestrian in a
car-pedestrian tussle. I did a bunch of damage to the
car… but, all in all, I have to say that the car got the
better of me.” So starts one dramatic personal story on a new Web site
called The Experience Project. Founded by Armen Berjikly, a
26-year-old Armenian entrepreneur from San Francisco, The
Experience Project is billed as “the discreet reality
community where you’re free to be yourself.” The primary
concept of the site centers on community members sharing
personal stories and wisdom about the experiences they find
important in their lives. Alongside remembrances of
accidents, the experiences on the site run the gamut from
the serious, such as coping with the death of one’s father
or dealing with racism, to the light-hearted, such as
memories of a first kiss or drinking too much. With the soaring popularity of online personal journals (blogs)
and social networking sites such as Myspace, people are now
very comfortable with the idea of sharing personal
information online. However, these sites can easily become
too public, with your identifying information, including
your name, picture, friend’s names, and so on, being stored
in publicly accessible databases indefinitely. This may be
fine when recollecting the trivialities of daily life, but
for more provocative issues, privacy concerns become
paramount. “But it is exactly these sensitive experiences
that shape us into who we are, and are therefore the most
critical ones to discuss freely,” notes Berjikly. “You’re
probably not going to talk about your battle with depression
next to a picture of your smiling face, but talking about it
will help bring about healing, not only by simply expressing
your thoughts in print, but also by connecting you with
others who understand exactly what you’re going through
since they’ve been through it themselves.” After growing up in Los Angeles, Berjikly attended Stanford
University, where he majored in computer science and
management science. Though he found his first job out of
college as a product manager in a San Jose technology firm
“truly rewarding,” he used his spare time to chase his
personal goals. “”My passion is to use technology, and the
Internet in particular, to unite people who would benefit
from knowing each other.” With that in mind, he began
creating not-for-profit Internet health communities, where
patients with serious illnesses were able to virtually
gather and discuss their treatment strategies and research.
“It sponsored both hope and a sense of belonging for people
that, prior to the availability of the Internet, would have
been entirely isolated from society.” The success of these sites led Berjikly to a realization:
each of these communities were based on a single common
experience—for example, having multiple sclerosis. “Every person faces adversity in their lives, and no person
is defined by any one experience. And the first thing we as
humans want to do when challenged is to talk to someone else
that has been there before.” The result was the Experience
Project, a site designed for users to share detailed
personal experiences across the spectrum of things they find
meaningful, and likewise to take advantage of collective
wisdom for experiences they haven’t had yet. In the process,
they are able to connect with other people who have had
experiences similar to them—connections based on, “who you
are, not who you know” notes Berjikly. The site, which is
free to use, does not allow members to reveal their real
names or display personal photographs, in an effort to
encourage openness by removing the fear of potential
recognition. “Essentially, Experience Project is a comfortable place
where you can be yourself without being recognized, and
participate in a community that will understand, help and
support you through their collective wisdom, knowing that
you will do the same for them in your areas of life
expertise,” says Berjikly. “Imagine the hundreds of people that you walk past each day
and never speak to—what if just one of those people could be
the most interesting person you ever met, if only you knew
which one to talk to and what questions to ask. I believe
our technology can make this possible, and the benefits for
our users are immense.”
The Experience Project can be found at
http://www.experienceproject.com
Armen Berjikly can be reached at armenb@experienceproject.com.
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