Omil

What it is

Omil is an Android app for gathering a day together with friends. In a space only invited people can join, each of you leaves a moment of today, a 3 second video or a single photo, and the day's moments play in the order they were taken as Today's reel. Moments that different friends took around the same time play next to each other in Side by side. The app is in English, Korean and Japanese.

Problem it solves

You want to reach out to a friend, but with nothing in particular to say it is hard to start a conversation. Photos and videos in a group chat get buried in the talk, and keeping a vlog means filming, choosing and editing. When everyone is busy and you rarely meet, you lose track of how the others are doing. On Omil you only leave a short moment that needs no reply. It is gathered by day with your friends' moments and becomes one reel. No need to film well, and nothing special has to happen.

Who it is for

• Close friends who want to keep in touch but do not always start a conversation
• People curious about each other's ordinary days who are comfortable sharing photos and short videos
• Groups of friends who live apart or are too busy to meet often

Core loop

1. Sign in with Google and choose the name you use in the app.
2. Create a space or join one with an invite code. Whoever creates a space takes the first moment right away, then invites friends with a link, a code or a QR code.
3. Tap the shutter in the middle of the bottom bar to take a 3 second video or a photo. Pick a look and a one-line caption, then post.
4. After posting, your moment and the friend's moment taken closest to it appear side by side.
5. Play Today's reel or open Side by side to watch your friends' day. Open past days from the calendar in the Days tab.

Main features

• Capture: a 3 second video by default, or a photo, or Both cameras, a back camera photo with a small selfie on top. You can also post a photo from your phone.
• Looks and Glow: six looks (Original, Warm, Clear, Film, Calm and Mono) and a Glow slider that gently lifts brightness, contrast and warmth. There are no touch-ups that reshape faces.
• Add place: add a place name like "Seongdong-gu, Seoul" only when you want to. Coordinates are never stored.
• Today's reel: it opens with a film leader countdown and plays the day's moments in the order they were taken. Lay one of six music tracks that come with the app under it, and save it to your phone as one vertical video.
• Side by side: for each part of the day, moments from different friends are paired by how close in time they were taken and shown on a split screen.
• Together time: when the space owner turns it on, everyone gets the same notification at the same moment once a day. No timer, no late marks.
• Leave one of five reactions or a reply of up to 200 characters.
• The day changes at 4 a.m. in the space's time zone, so a moment taken past midnight still belongs to that night.
• Report and block, quiet hours, and notification settings for each space.
• Today's topic: anyone in the space sets a one-line prompt such as "Out the window" or "Today's snack". The app offers ideas, and nobody has to follow it.
• Home screen widget: a friend's newest moment shows up on your home screen like a print.

Product decisions

• No empty slots for people who have not posted, no "hasn't posted yet" labels, no rankings and no streaks. A day you skip simply passes and is never marked as a failure.
• You do not have to post to see your friends' moments. Instead, posting rewards you with a friend's moment from around the same time, side by side.
• Notifications never nag with lines like "everyone else has posted" or "don't miss out". New moment notifications come at most once every 20 minutes per space.
• Spaces are invite-only, hold up to 10 people and cannot be searched. Omil never asks for your contacts. New members can see the space's past moments, so the invite screen and the capture screen say so up front.
• The screens feel like developing a day shot on film in a darkroom. Your friends' photos are the brightest thing on screen and everything else steps back.

Pricing

Free, with no ads and no purchases.

Next hypotheses

We think the ordinary moments of close friends are worth coming back to without any nudging, when they are shared briefly and watched together. We will check this by measuring how many spaces see two or more different people post in a week and open Today's reel or Side by side, and how many of those spaces are still active after one week and four weeks.

Support and privacy

• Contact: Email us or the contact page
• Privacy policy: The privacy policy explains Google sign-in, moments, reactions and replies, who sees what, notifications, usage statistics, where data is kept and for how long, and how to delete your account.
• Community rules: The community rules cover what not to post, reporting and blocking, and the minimum age.
• Delete your account: In the app, open Settings and tap Delete account. Without the app, email hello@mrlatte.net from the address of your Google account and ask us to delete your Omil account.