

Quick Pitch: TwoSides makes it easy to see every side of an issue and compare viewpoints with others.
Genius Idea: See how your viewpoints match up against the presidential candidates.
The world would be a better place if everyone looked at every side of an issue. Or at least that's the premise behind TwoSides, a startup launching this week as a social debate platform.
TwoSides provides web denizens with a place to view all sides of an issue, share their viewpoints, and see how their viewpoints match up against those of other site users or the 2012 presidential candidates.
The site centers around user-created Issue Pages. An issue could encompass anything from a political hotbed issue such as gay marriage to something more predictive like the success of the Kindle Fire.
You can either vote to agree with one of the existing viewpoints of an issue, add your own viewpoint, and share or curate evidence to support your points-of-views and potentially persuade others. All viewpoint votes are tallied and displayed in colorful consensus charts.
The more you agree with viewpoints, the better you can compare yourself against friends and other TwoSides others.

The site, explains founder Jono Lee, was born out of his own personal frustration with surfing the web to research all sides of an issue. "There's a huge problem with trying to find balanced information on the internet," Lee says.
And while TwoSides users double as Issue Page editors -- who will bring their personal biases to the site, no doubt -- the point is to foster informed discussions and debates where all viewpoints are represented.
The just-launched product, however, suffers from a small user base and seemingly low levels of activity. A majority of issue pages have only attracted a handful of votes, for instance, and even fewer users are adding their own evidence to back up their views.
The young startup hopes to sidestep the problem with its Election 2012 campaign. The module encourages you to vote on election issues to see how your viewpoints stack up against the 2012 presidential candidates, debate the issues or just learn more about them.
"We want to help increase tolerance and help people be more informed," Lee says. "We want to eliminate a narrow-minded way of consuming news."
Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark
