What it is
A username is a display name and an address. It travels between circles and devices, so a phone you have never held before can still know how your name is said.
It is not a key to anything. Nobody needs one to play, to be called, to be recorded, or to be in a circle with you — the app is free and account-free, and it stays that way. Holding a name means only that nobody else is called by it.
Usernames are for adults. Circles in classrooms run on the teacher's device with no accounts at all, which is the whole reason a school can say yes to this.
Hold one now
Claiming is not open yet. What you can do today is hold a name in line, and the order names are held in is the one thing that cannot be sorted out afterwards.
One address, verified once. We send a link, you open it, and that is both halves of the job — it proves the address is yours and holds the name in the same press.
The form here could not load. It needs JavaScript and a connection; the rest of this page needs neither.
Held.
Already have an account? See everything it holds, or delete it.
What it will cost
When claiming opens, a username is $3 to claim, once and not refundable, and $12 a year to hold. Nothing is charged today, and holding a name here does not enter a card or commit you to anything.
It works the way a domain name does. You are not buying the string — you are holding a registration, for as long as you keep it. Unlike a domain, it cannot be sold or transferred to anybody else, which is what keeps names in the hands of people who want to be called by them.
When claiming opens we will write to you. Your place is held for 30 days from that day, and then the name goes back to everyone else. We would rather tell you that now than at the end of the thirty days.
A username can be bought here and nowhere else. The app never sells one and never asks — it recognises a name you already hold, and that is all it does with it.
What is stored
The address you just verified, and the name you are holding. That is the whole record.
Nothing from the app is here. Players' names, voices and photographs are written to the phone that recorded them and have never left it — no circle, and nobody in one, is on a server anywhere.
Releasing the name leaves your account, because it is the same account the app, the magazine and the ball use. Sign out, or delete the account itself.
Go and play
Three people and something soft to throw. None of this is needed for that, and it never will be.