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Microsoft's Tossup app makes it easier to meet your friends for lunch

Microsoft's Tossup app makes it easier to meet your friends for lunch

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Is getting together for lunch with a few friends really that difficult in 2015? Microsoft seems to think so. Today, the company's Garage group is back again with another cross-platform app called Tossup. Available on iOS and Android (in the US to start), the app acts as a hub where users can collectively figure out exactly what they want to do — and help pinpoint the best time when everyone's free to meet up.

You ask a question to start (i.e. "Who's in for dinner tomorrow?") and your friends can reply either through the app or over SMS if they don't have Tossup installed. Polls can be simple yes or no questions, and you've also got the choice of allowing custom suggestions. Conveniently, Yelp ratings are built right into the app, so that's one less step you'll need to take when researching new meeting spots. Once you finalize the crucial where question, Tossup also tries to streamline picking a time with calendar integration.

Is this approach to decision making more compelling than just hammering things out over email? Maybe, but even if not, it's really just another quirky side experiment built by Microsoft's employees through the Garage program. They're not betting the company on this stuff. But to the frustrations of some, it's also yet another Garage app that has no Windows Phone version.