If someone asked you whether the world needs another question-and-answer app or not, you would likely respond in the negative. But that doesn’t stop startups from trying to bring something new to the Q&A table.
With that in mind, Pyne lets users ask and answer basic yes/no or multiple-choice questions from across the community.
“Answering questions like ‘Do you like Japanese pop music?’ combines the instant gratification of a Buzzfeed quiz with the flip-happy speed of a dating app like Tinder,” wrote The New York Times when it launched for iPhone back in June. And it’s difficult to argue with this summary.
Today, Pyne arrives for Android users too. Here’s a quick look at how it works.
Pyne for Android
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Once you’ve created your account, you’re immediately presented with a random question from the community. In this case, I’m not actually able to answer it as it’s a very US-focused question, so I swipe left and opt to skip it.
One thing I’d say is that it would be better if you could target questions by region, as this would go some way towards eliminating the issue I experienced here.
Questions include pretty much everything and anything, from your preferred direction of time travel (backwards or forwards), to the worst body part to experience pain. However, you can narrow things down within the Categories section of Settings, meaning you only see questions that matter to you.
It’s worth adding here that the layout of the questions could perhaps be better – as you can see in the screenshot above left, there is a large, empty gap between the question and potential answers beneath, which seems unnecessary.
Once you’ve answered a question, you can see how many votes it’s had so far and other related data via a graphical breakdown.
If you want to add your own question to the mix, it’s easy to do so from the main menu – ask a simple yes/no or multiple-choice question, include an optional photo, indicate whether you’re targeting men or women specifically, and you’re good to go.
In terms of the potential use-cases for Pyne, there are many. It could be used by journalists to carry out quick straw-polls to gauge public opinion, or a marketer could maybe use it to see which potential new product name resonates most with the world.
As noted already, it would be great if you could geo-target questions – as things stand, you can only really target by subject category and gender.
Pyne is a nicely designed app that’s intuitive and easy to use. It can be easy to throw tons of features at platforms such as this, but by keeping things minimal and focusing on the questions and answers, it has the potential to grow into a powerful polling tool.
Read next: The Best Polling Apps on the Web
➤ Pyne [Android]
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