From original article at Technical.ly DC 

Marcus Bullock is the founder of the tech app Flikshop, a tech startup that allows users to communicate with an incarcerated family member or friend via a mobile app which prints their digital message out as a postcard and mails it for 99 cents. The app allows families to communicate digitally with their loved ones in prison. 

The idea came from when he remembered how meaningful it was to hear from the outside world while he was incarcerated. The Washington, D.C., native was sentenced in a maximum security prison for his involvement in a carjacking when he was fifteen years old. Since people rarely write anymore Bullock realized that letters weren’t the most effective way of communication now that everything is digital.

“There’s no Facebook in prison. No Snapchat, no Instagram, no Twitter, no texting,” Bullock said. “Yet we’ve connected almost 150,000 families so far in having shipped almost half a million Flikshops.”

Bullock added: “We want to make communities safer and decarcerate America by keeping families connected. We know that family engagement is high for people that are in these prisons cells, and that means that they’ll probably come home, be more engaged with their loved ones who will be less likely, less susceptible to the crime we see happening when most of these people are coming home and reoffending.” 

Music artist John Legend is an investor. (He's speaking with Bullock in this YouTube video.) 

In this clip, Marcus shares what a vital lifeline daily mail call was for him while he was serving his sentence and how meaningful it was for him to hear from the outside world.  

You can view Bullock's 2019 TED Talk or read about him in The Undefeated, Washington Post, or Forbes. He is listed as #93 in The Root's 2019 100 Most Influential African Americans.