Mission

Our mission is to give people a home for the information they care about—a safe, simple alternative to the constant distraction, manipulation, and surveillance of big tech.

Founders

Co-founders Chris van der Walt and Michael Grossman have unique experiences that have shaped Factr.

Chris van der Walt has over 20 years of experience as a graphic and interaction designer across various sectors. For almost a decade, he worked at the United Nations, where he was a member of the founding team at Global Pulse, an innovation initiative of the United Nations Secretary-General. The team sought to apply real-time and big data to sustainable development and humanitarian action.

Michael Grossman is a long-time creative director, editor, and consultant with over 30 years of experience leading multiple startups and legacy media brands into the digital arena. A charter member of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (which has juried the Webby Awards since the mid-’90s), he’s focused on the evolution of content-sharing in online communities.

Chris and Michael certainly aren't working alone. Factr is built by a small but incredibly talented team of engineers, communications people, freelancers—and with the invaluable support and advice of our community of family, friends, neighbors, colleagues, and advisors.

Factr’s origins

Factr is an outgrowth of two projects that Michael and Chris were working on individually.

Coming out of the content world, Michael was creating a community where subject-matter expertise (rather than sheer popularity) was used to recognize value, amplifying weak signals.

After his time at the UN, Chris was working on a project focused on ways to collaboratively evaluate real-time intelligence, and quickly form and ratify actionable hypotheses.

After a lot of idea-sharing at their local coffee spot, they decided to team up. Now, their goal is to build a platform that gives members unequaled control of their information, and enhances their ability to discover, organize, and share knowledge—maximizing both privacy and productivity.