KATHERINE IKEDA
founder, chief human helper, BROOKLYNITE
Katherine Ikeda is the founder of FWD (for-ward), a human-first, social infrastructure that optimizes human connections.
Katherine’s path began far from technology. She is both an outsider and an insider: an outsider to the tech establishment, but an insider to one of humanity’s most common struggles: disconnection.
Born into addiction while her mother was incarcerated, Katherine spent her childhood in orphanages, foster care, group homes and homeless on Skid Row. But she moved forward because she reached out and others reached back.
Chains of care by everyday people carried her from fractured beginnings to Georgetown Law and to serving as Deputy Chief Legal Officer at one of the world’s most prestigious law firms.
Her life reveals a truth: access to all types of connection, that allow us to fundamentally flourish, is not evenly distributed. Connection is critical to advancing lives and dispelling inequities that are exponentially growing in our society. And today, too often, the social platforms meant to bring us together deepen existing inequalities and disconnection. She built FWD to change that.
FWD is a continuation of her lifelong work in service of others, and a commitment to building a world where helping one another is not the exception, but the norm.
“When we help one another, we all move forward.”
we’re building fwd
“The future of social is not more artificial, it’s more human. It’s the best of humanity, amplified by technology.”
FWD is designed to do what conventional social platforms have failed to do: create meaningful human connections that move people forward in all areas of their life, at scale.
Instead of siloing people into different categories of connection, FWD collapses social verticals and their barriers to reflect and amplify how our real life networks actually work — fluid, multipurpose, mutually beneficial, and human-first.
FWD is built on self-serving altruism, social collaboration, and reciprocity. Each introduction or act of support strengthens a shared network, creating new opportunities that extend far beyond a single exchange. Unlike legacy platforms driven by content, ads, and algorithms — that suck people in, keep them engaged, make them sick, and leave them stuck — FWD creates a more connected and effective human internet: people helping each other directly, intentionally, and without noise. Creating an infinity loop of human power.
At its core, FWD expands access to social connection and social capital, the hidden currency that shapes careers, communities, and lives. Katherine founded FWD to make those opportunities easier, more effective and inclusive, so that progress is determined by our willingness to help and be helped not the confines of what we have or who we know.
news & commentary
We can’t rely on the police to stop shootings before they happen - CNN (article)
Editor’s Note: Authored by Katherine Ikeda, an attorney who earned her JD at Georgetown University Law Center. She was a Coro Public Affairs Fellow, and has been published in peer-reviewed legal journals throughout her career.
Fired for being gay - How its still legal in 48 states - FOX (video)
Katherine Ikeda explains the controversy surrounding Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.