To understand Robinhood, you must understand who you’re messaging

Here’s a dumb question: Have you heard of Robinhood?

It’s a mobile application. It allows you to buy and sell stock. You can even book put-call options like a professional trader. And, in the past 15 days, it has received more social media mentions and front-page headlines than climate change, coronavirus, and unbelievably, former President Trump.

Okay, so that last sentence is author speculation. However, Robinhood is everywhere, mainly due to a group of amateur traders with incredible internet-handles using the app to execute their designs.

Chief among tho se designs was the push that drove GameStop’s share price up 1726%, over a 15-day stretch, while the company’s operations continued to falter.

To fully explain what occurred in the collision between Reddit, Robinhood, and GameStop, you would need to be an expert in financial regulation, financial deregulation, meme culture, hedge funds, short-selling, meritocracy, civil disobedience, and message-board hive minds. It’s no wonder we haven’t received a clear answer. There isn’t one.

However, the heart of any application-powered marketplace is messaging. Application messaging has obscured over time, favoring marketplace functionality over direct connection between participants. Robinhood takes this development to new heights.

Originally published at https://stephenxblackwell.medium.com on February 2, 2021.