Google's Area 120 reveals Pinterest-like app called Keen

The latest experiment to come out of Google’s Area 120 sounds an awful lot like Pinterest. The new web and Android app, Keen, encourages users to make a “Keen” (essentially a Pinterest board) about any topic they’d like. Users can add links, photos and other resources, invite friends to collaborate and follow “Keens” they find interesting. Behind the scenes, Google will use its machine learning to suggest related content.

“Keen lets you curate the content you love, share your collection with others and find new content based on what you have saved,” co-founder CJ Adams wrote in a blog post.

Supposedly, the app is meant to help people spend more time learning about interests or new hobbies and less time mindlessly scrolling. The similarities to Pinterest are glaring, but that’s not totally surprising. Every once in a while, a new take on Pinterest comes along. Just yesterday, we learned that Facebook is testing ways to make Collections easier to share and collaborate on. Google introduced its own shareable Collections earlier this year, and Instagram has Collections, too. Keen, at least, has a unique name, but at this point, that may be its only distinguishing feature.