why pronto exists.

Hey. I'm Fran.

I built Pronto because I think we lost the art of the casual hangout.

Plans are getting booked weeks out now. Birthdays, dinners, even casual Saturday day drinking. Everything has a calendar invite and a five-day lead time. I get it. Everyone's busier than ever.

But what happened to just dropping by someone's house? Or last-minute tacos on a Tuesday because the place on the corner has a deal?

Watching Friends, or Seinfeld, or HIMYM, feels like watching another reality. And it kind of is.

So most free nights we don't try. We doomscroll for three hours and wonder where the evening went. Where the week went. Feeling even more tired.

Pronto is my attempt to fix that.

What used to make spontaneous plans hard for me is the fear of being ignored, of failing. I'd think about inviting someone to something, get caught up on the who and what and when, then give up. So I didn't invite anyone, no one invited me, and that was that.

What I only realized later is that when I started putting myself out there more, just going for it then a few plans would come together. And the momentum built.

Pronto is built to make that easier. You have an idea, you drop a beacon, your friends get a notification. You choose who sees it. Add as much or as little detail as you want. The beacon is your canvas. The art is what happens outside the app.

Bring back the casual hang with me. Send a beacon pronto.

— Fran

PS. Pronto used to be called Inpromptu. It was my first try at this idea and had some barriers I didn't see at the time. This is the improved version. Same idea, better meaning.