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Tech Should Bring Us Closer—and I Want to Fulfill that Promise

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Frustrated by the limits of screens, I co-founded a start-up that aims to connect family members across the miles

“Chime In” comprises brief first-person essays by Cornellians. Do you have a topic in mind? Email us at cornellians@cornell.edu!

By Alex Colket ’01

Most Cornell students have families living far from Ithaca. I arrived on the Hill from Connecticut in the mid-1990s, right when the Internet was starting to promise it could make it easier to stay connected.

Email had been around a couple of years, AOL Instant Messenger had recently shown up, and there was a sense that distance from the people you loved was a problem that technology was about to solve.

Three decades later, I’m still in Ithaca, and my family is scattered all over—across states, and for a while across an ocean.

For several years, I watched my nephews growing up mostly on the other end of a screen.

So I’ve had a long time to watch that original promise—that the tools would close the distance—play out in real time, one platform at a time. And mostly, it hasn’t delivered on its potential.

My family is scattered all over—across states, and for a while across an ocean. For several years, I watched my nephews growing up mostly on the other end of a screen.

A phone call, a FaceTime, a WhatsApp video chat—they’re something, but they’re also missing so much, especially when kids are involved. It’s nothing like actually hanging out together in the living room.

The call is too short, the kid gets bored or shy or wanders off mid-sentence to go find a toy, and everyone hangs up a little unsatisfied, having technically “connected” and somehow not connected at all.

Alex Colket holding his young nephews in a green field — The author with his nephews.

Somewhere in there, the thing that was supposed to be social stopped being very social at all. Most of what we do on these platforms, even when it’s “about” other people, is something we do alone: scrolling.

More recently, the family group chat has quietly become the best tool we have. It’s lower-commitment than an email thread, and easier to pop into and out of; it’s kept my family looped in on each other’s days in a way that actually works.

But even that tends to top out at logistics and updates: photos, plans, the occasional joke. It’s rarely the place where a six-year-old and a grandmother actually play together, make something, or share a moment that isn’t just information passing between two screens.

That’s the piece I kept bumping into: the tools we have are good at transmitting facts and bad at transmitting play.

Most of what we do on these platforms, even when it’s 'about' other people, is something we do alone: scrolling.

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And play, it turns out, is most of what keeps a relationship between a kid and a distant relative alive. More than any update or piece of news, it’s the shared joke, the game, the thing you build together.

So a couple of years ago, my sister and I started building the thing we actually wanted for our own family: a shared digital space designed around play instead of posting, where a kid and a grandparent an ocean apart can genuinely do something together, not just report on their days.

Alex Colket in a vintage family portrait with his two sisters — A vintage "awkward family photo" of Colket and his sisters.

We call it KinClub—a private digital home with games, creative tools, a family chat, a shared calendar, and more.

Family connection isn’t just a nice-to-have. It’s tied up with mental health, with a kid’s sense of security, with the kind of support that helps someone actually get ahead in life. It’s the stuff of belonging, not just convenience.

Family connection isn’t just a nice-to-have. It’s tied up with mental health, with a kid’s sense of security, with the kind of support that helps someone actually get ahead in life. It’s the stuff of belonging, not just convenience.

And for all its promise, technology has too often made that harder instead of easier: screen time has reportedly overtaken chores and homework as the number-one source of arguments between parents and kids in American households.

A screenshot of a KinClub page showing 'active games' — A sampling of the KinClub platform.

The tools built to connect us across distance have, in a lot of homes, become the thing driving people apart even when they’re in the same room.

KinClub is my attempt to push back on that: to take the same screen that’s causing so much friction, and use it to create real connection.

Alex Colket ’01 majored in neurobiology and behavior in CALS. When he’s not busy building products, he loves dancing, gardening, games, cooking, and spending time near water.

(All images provided.)

Published October 20, 2026