An AI-powered social trivia platform where players prove what they know, earn titles, and turn every result into a challenge with friends or strangers.
Trivia proves demand.
The old model breaks retention.
Trivia hits prove enormous consumer demand. But the category has mostly run on content, novelty, and prizes. Smartville changes the model to identity, status, and network.
Millions of players at peak. Demand was real. The prize model was not.
Massive global appetite. Limited compounding identity.
A cultural phenomenon. Habit proved, but social depth was thin.
Content, not systems
The 50,000th player gets the same flat question bank as the 50th. No model of you.
Socially weak
A leaderboard is a number. It does not create a self-image players defend.
The novelty cliff
The first hit is curiosity. The second, third, and tenth session need identity.
No loop-safe business
Prizes lose money. Ads degrade. Pay-to-win kills trust.
No AI that knows you
Nothing learns your knowledge or challenges you "just enough" to keep coming back.
Founder has already built the loops
Smartville is modernizing
Short-session challenge loops. Built and ranked #1.
Daily habit and repeat engagement. Built and ranked #1.
Fuses both, then adds AI identity, social challenge, crowns, and loop-safe monetization.
Not a first attempt at trivia. A second-generation thesis built from category experience.
People do not want to answer questions.
They want to win the argument about who they are.
Knowledge is the last socially acceptable flex.
Identity
"I'm the smart one. A real fan."
A self-concept made visible.
Rivalry
"I'm better than you, specifically."
Targeted and repeatable.
Fandom
"I belong to this tribe, and I can prove it."
Sports, shows, music.
Status
"Here's the evidence, and I want it seen."
The share is the point.
Four systems turn trivia into a status network
Built for the individual, not the average. Every round sharpens the model of you.
Smart Graph
A persistent model of how you play: accuracy, speed, topic strengths, and nerve under pressure. Every round makes the next one smarter.
AI Game Director
Sequences each round like a game show: warm-up, traps, pressure, crown question. The round feels designed, not random.
Smart Identity
Reads how you played, not just what you scored, into a share-worthy result. This is the first "wow" moment.
Crown Room
Turns knowledge into titles, badges, and crowns players can collect, defend, and show off.
One 90-second loop. No signup wall.
A frictionless round that ends in a shareable identity and a head-to-head challenge.
Pick a topic
A team, show, creator, category, or subject you care about.
Play the round
10 questions, AI-directed like a game show.
Get your Smart Identity
A readout of how you played, not just what you scored.
Earn status
Titles, crowns, and rank you can defend.
Challenge a friend
Share a card of how you did. They play instantly. No signup required.
Our moat is not that AI writes questions
Question generation is commodity. Identity and behavioral data compound.
AI question
generation
Commodity. Cheap and getting cheaper. A competitor can replicate basic question generation quickly.
Social identity network
Crowns, rivalries, and challenge history do not travel to a competitor.
The player graph
A stateful behavioral model no competitor can cold-start. It compounds every round.
Verified-question trust layer
AI-write, AI-verify, human-approve. For ranked and sponsored play, trust is the product.
Game Director craft
Round sequencing tuned against Smartville engagement data. Harder to copy than question text.
The challenge is the growth atom
for status
- No signup wall on accept. The loop cannot leak at its most expensive step.
- Head-to-head and personal, not "you're #4,021 globally."
- Players share status, not scores. "Top 2% Swiftie, and I beat you" travels.
- Every cycle can create a new rivalry.
- The identity is portable. A result card drops into iMessage, group chats, Discord, or TikTok, the way Words with Friends rode texting and Facebook.
A wedge into three monetization pools
Consumer games
Large market, but Smartville starts narrow: short-session social play with status cosmetics and subscription.
$150B consumer games¹
Creator & host SaaS
Creators, podcasters, bars, schools, and communities can host branded game rooms.
$250B creator economy²
Sponsored challenges
Brands fund measurable, shareable games around fandom, events, and creators.
$32B influencer marketing³
Duolingo is the best gamified-freemium comp, but it is utility-driven. We do not model Duolingo conversion. We model 2–4% paid conversion for engaged players.
Start where rivalry, identity, and sponsor dollars overlap. Bottom-up: 1,000 creator/community rooms at $19–49/mo, plus 2–4% consumer-paid conversion among engaged players, plus sponsored challenges once reach exists.
Loop-safe monetization: paid status, hosts, and sponsors
Status & cosmetics
Premium result cards, crown effects, title frames, profile themes. Self-expression is the natural consumer spend.
Smartville Plus
Advanced stats, deeper Smart Graph, private leagues, crown history, ad-free.
Creator Pro
Branded rooms, scheduled events, custom leaderboards, analytics, sponsor slots.
Sponsored challenges
Measurable, shareable games around fandom, events, and creators.
Start where rivalry already exists
Initial wedge: sports fandom challenges around tentpole moments.
Sports & fandom
Challenges around a tentpole sports moment.
Friend challenges
Every result becomes a head-to-head link. No signup required to accept.
Creators
Seed sports podcasters, fan pages, and fandom creators.
Bars & campuses
QR-join rooms for watch parties, alumni groups, and schools.
Sponsored challenges
Brand-funded activations once reach and repeat play are proven.
What this raise is designed to prove
Can Smartville turn a trivia spike into repeat play, sharing, and loop-safe monetization?
Built by a founder who has already won in this category
Lawrence Schwartz
Built in the exact short-session and daily-habit categories Smartville is modernizing. Also led an AI-based enterprise learning company.
Deep experience across product, distribution, marketing, fundraising, partnerships, and company building.
The Ask
Play → Rank → Identity → Challenge → Rematch → Monetize
- Ship Smart Identity, Crown Room, challenges, and leaderboards
- Build the verified-question pipeline and AI Game Director foundation
- Launch a sports/fandom wedge around a tentpole moment
- Instrument retention, sharing, challenge acceptance, and rematch
- Add senior product, engineering, and growth support
The $8M base, bottoms-up
Built from drivers, not a top-down market percentage. Conservative ($1.2M) and Upside ($80M) flex the same levers.