How it started
Barcelona, late night. Like most people in the gay community here,
I'd spent years cycling through the same apps — Grindr, Scruff, the rest.
And the experience was always some version of the same thing: an ocean of
profiles, very little signal, and a dynamic that felt more like a catalogue
than a community.
It wasn't just the apps. It was the pattern. Men looking to connect
with other men — for something real, whether that's a relationship,
a genuine friendship, or just an honest conversation — had nowhere designed
for them. Everything was optimised for volume. Nothing was optimised for quality.
I'm an engineer. When I see a problem I understand personally, I build the
solution. So I started building Troy Circle — not as a product, but as
the space I actually wanted to exist.
The idea was simple but uncompromising: an invite-only community where
every member is reviewed by a real person, where behaviour has real
consequences, and where the standard from day one is
show up as your real self or don't show up at all.
Why this matters
Stigmas don't disappear.
They get designed out.
The gay community has come a long way. But the apps we use every day still
carry ghosts of the old dynamics — the objectification, the anonymity used
as an excuse, the lack of accountability that lets toxic behaviour slide.
That's not liberation. That's just a different cage.
Troy Circle is built on a different premise: that men who are attracted to
other men — however they define themselves, whatever labels they use or don't
use — deserve a space where the quality of interaction is protected by design.
Not by moderation alone. By community structure.
The Moral Score exists because accountability needs to be built in, not
bolted on. The invite-only model exists because trust spreads person to person,
not through an open signup page. Every decision in this product comes from the
same question: what would make this a place worth belonging to?
I'm 23. I've spent enough time in Barcelona's night scene, in its community,
in its conversations to know exactly what's missing. And I'm putting everything
I have into building it.