Gabriola Island gets connected with a new locally made social media app
Bender first started coding the app by hand, leaning on her background as a software developer. (Photo by Jesse Woodward / CHLY 101.7FM)
A Gabriola Island software engineer is taking on tech giants by creating her own community hub for the gulf island.
Barnacle Exchange is an up and coming application developed by software engineer Jacqlyn Bender. The app is a local platform made to help Gabriola Island residents connect, trade, shop and share within the community as an alternative to platforms owned by big tech companies like Meta.
Barnacle Exchange head software engineer Jacqlyn Bender explained what the app does.
“I mean, our primary goal is to connect people in real life. So, um, our app has succeeded if we see people getting out in the community, hosting events, meeting new people, joining new groups,” said Bender. “You know, connecting people with services that they need, connecting people socially.”
Bender explained she grew up in Canada but began her career as a history teacher in charter schools in the United States. She would change career tracks and work for massive tech companies such as Morgan Stanley and Shopify, eventually leaving them behind and moving to Gabriola Island to be with family.
She explained what inspired her to take on this task.
“I really wanted to make this app because I've been feeling angry at Meta for a long time for the way it basically treats its users as a giant data farm and the way it hijacks people's attention to keep them scrolling and, you know, generating ad revenue. We see a lot of hate speech, misinformation, conspiracy theories that sort of content getting boosted by their algorithm because that keeps eyeballs on their app,” said Bender. “ As a community on Gabriola, we are poorly served by Facebook, and I wanted to create a trustworthy alternative that allows us to connect and spend more time together in real life rather than keeping us glued to a platform that basically exists to harvest our data and our attention.”
Somewhat ironically, Bender announced the app in a Gabriola Facebook group, and says she saw a positive response, with enthusiastic comments and up to 150 early subscribers.
Bender said a lot of people who check out the app are signing up.
“I look at our page metrics and 40% of the people who, visited the page have signed up, so to me that's a pretty good conversion rate, and of course, people can join later … Yeah, the response seems to be overwhelmingly positive.”
Bender first started coding the app by hand, leaning on her background as a software developer. She eventually would use AI tools, such as Claude and Codex to aid the development process. She says she was able to include many features she wasn't expecting to be able to, such as a business directory, farm stand map and general local relevant information like tide charts, fire hazard ratings and curbside waste reminders.
She explained her stance on AI and clarified her use of the tool during the app’s development.
“AI has definitely played a big role in developing this. I don't think I would've been able to do this as robustly and as quickly without the way AI has advanced, especially as it relates to software engineering,” said Bender. “ Even though I used AI for the engineering aspect of this, every piece of the content on Barnacle Exchange is written by me. The colors, you know, the design, that's all chosen by me. I paid a local artist for the block-printed, barnacle logo and, you know, I even paid to license fonts from a small type foundry. So like I'm trying to walk the walk as much as possible here in creating, you know, like what you see as AI-free, even though the … what's running underneath, has been developed by AI.”
Bender says she’s committed to creating an online space free from AI generated content. She says no AI tools will be integrated into the user experience and no AI services will be running under the hood. She also says she’ll do everything in her power to prevent AI bots from consuming member data and using it for training purposes.
Bender has commented that she disapproves of what artificial intelligence is doing to society, with the rise of its use in creative fields and in creating flyers and text. She says the app’s funding model is yet to be defined, however, she believes the app could feature a donation model and she has also considered pursuing grants to support the app and make it sustainable by covering future infrastructure costs. Bender said she hopes the idea behind the app sparks an interest beyond Gabriola.
“For now, I mean, a lot of the special features are specifically tailored to Gabriola, but I think as an app, this could be valuable. Like, there's lots of other great communities out there, and that are the size of Gabriola too. I think it would be great, you know … if other communities wanted to use this, to get themselves off of Facebook.”
Bender is aiming to release Barnacle Exchange this holiday season. She said she’s considering holding a launch event for the community to engage and get to know how the app works.
Further information is available on the barnacle exchange website.
Funding Note: This story was produced with funding support from the Local Journalism Initiative, administered by the Community Radio Fund of Canada.
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