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A Chinese Start-up Adds Social Fun To Travel

Specialist social media can be super-useful in their specificity – and Tong Xing (‘Journey Together’ in Chinese) is a prime example of this. It’s a light-weight social network for people who want to make a plane, train, or taxi ride with another interesting individual in order to brighten-up their travels. If that isn’t niche, then I don’t know what is.

Tong Xin has an iPhone app already (though, disappointingly, no Android version) which allows users to search by flight or train numbers – or specific locations – in order to see who else is making that exact same trip on the same day. That gives users the option to make contact, and be assured that the other person is not a psycho. And, best of all, the two might have some mutual interests and thereby connect to make the journey together.

In addition to providing some company, the Tong Xin service integrates with other social media such as Sina Weibo to make your journey even easier to microblog. Plus, it provides some ancillary functions, such as reminders of flight delays and severe weather warnings, and ‘mayor’-like rewards that are familiar from LBS such as Foursquare and Jiepang. The founder of Tong Xin is a university senior named Cheng Lu who’s at business school, and the Chinese start-up team’s average age in 23. Interviewed by a Netease (163.com) reporter, Cheng Lu said that he’s aiming for 100,000 users soon, and then his team will look more seriously at business models.

If you want to try out Tong Xin, here’s the iTunes App Store link, or just check out its homepage.