Let's Whisper a Secret
There's yet another emerging trend in tech these days. Secrets. Anonymous posts. While being anonymous behind a keyboard isn't revolutionary or new, apps that allow people to reveal themselves only through anonymity is gaining traction. Sure, there has been anonymous posts on the internet since the dawning of, well, the internet, but recently I've discovered the specific apps of "Secret" and "Whisper" that really just allow you to post anything you want anonymously while getting anonymous feedback back.
As social media continues to destroy human interaction while also somehow encouraging more connectivity (my original blog post on the subject can be found HERE while two cool/sad videos that show the destruction of technology on social engagement can be found HERE and HERE) it has paved the way for strangers to seek validation, advice, or thoughts from other strangers. Or friends... as strangers. The results have been a mixed bag.
Let's first take a look at Whisper. Whisper is an app where you can (anonymously) post your thoughts. Anonymous users can also leave you comments. However, I had to delete Whisper after about 2 weeks when I realized that it is primarily made up of teens looking to either hook up, chat, or complain. Is our youth so troubled? Or does Whisper just lend a "voice" whereas when I was a teen, we just gossiped about these things in our inner circles or kept a journal/diary? I'm not sure which came first, Secret or Whisper, but they both act the same. They allow you to post your thoughts and get feedback without having to tie your identity to anything tangible. I look at Whisper and see Twitter, but without the character limit, the ability to make your own meme, and the ability to get interesting responses. Could Whisper actually be helpful to a teen that is depressed? Or a teen that wants to hook up? Seems like it. But as is with any anonymous platform, there are angels and there are demons. There are people that genuinely want to help and there are trolls that are willing to rip you to shreds. If you're in high school and you get bullied, do you now run to the anonymous Whisper app to share your feelings, only to get bullied there too? Who knows? I didn't stick on Whisper long enough to find out the true dichotomy of it all. It seemed like I was lurking in high school hallways and I felt dirty about it.
However, I am addicted to Secret. Secret is more of an adult version of Whisper and right now, it skews toward the tech brigade. Secret feels sort of cool because it feels like its own namesake: a secret. If you don't know about Secret, well, then you just don't know. But there goes Macster, telling everyone about it. Secret allows users to, again, anonymously post their thoughts and get back responses. Where as Whisper responses come with a photo or meme feel to it, Secret's flow more like an ongoing group text message. They have ridiculous icons that display for each user that responds to an "author's" secret. Those icons can include an owl, a spaceship, an ice cream cone, a puzzle piece, and my personal favorite... a piece of shit. Literally. Secret has taken some flak for what some feel is an elitist or exclusive vibe - as mentioned it's dominated by tech folks currently spouting so-called secrets about tech companies. It's sort of like reading a top secret Tech Crunch article and submitting comments where the writer actually responds. Secret is also getting a reputation for bullshit. Anyone can sign up and anyone can post. As far as I know, there are no verified accounts, so if I wanted to hop on and say Facebook was about to buy Secret for one trillion dollars and I work at Secret so I know these things, who's going to call me out and say it's false? Well, a lot of people will call me out. But no one will truly know if what I'm saying is true or not unless the event actually does or doesn't happen.
That being said, I still feel addicted to Secret. When I first joined, a lot of the chatter was tech related. However, as the months have gone by, I've started seeing more personal secrets posted. The way it works is that you connect to the app and it uses your contact list to figure out if your friends are on Secret or not. But YOU don't know which friends are on it. When a Secret is posted, it's defined as a post from a "Friend", "Friend of Friend", from some person some random distance away from you (for example, 1.3M away from you), or from a person from a random location (recently, a whole bunch from the United Kingdom but usually something more specific like "San Francisco" or "California"). I don't think I have a whole of friends using Secret right now but it has been interesting to see posts that come up from a "Friend" and trying to decipher who posted it. Secret doesn't really tell you how their algorithm works for dispersing secrets from non-friends but something tells me it has to do with what will get people talking and what will get a reaction from users.
The experience has been pretty interesting. I've been a part of some good conversations on Secret, all anonymous of course, relating to dating, shopping, hooking up, television shows, and general advice on life. I've also seen pretty horrific personal attacks. Again, anyone feels safe typing and posting stuff that's anonymous right? But it's been interesting. Aside from Facebook and SnapChat, Secret has probably become my 3rd most used social app. I check it more than Instragram and Twitter these days.
But what does it mean? On one hand, it's sort of nice to see these positive vibes thrown out to complete strangers. Or friends that seem like strangers since we can't identify them. Does that mean that we actually can still be decent people? That, given an arena, we're still receptive to having conversations with new people? Strangers? It's a bit baffling. We refuse to look a stranger in the eye on the MUNI but we very well could be giving them tips on how to prepare for a 3rd date via Secret.
It's a shifting social culture we live in these days. Some days I feel like all hope is lost and that human interaction will be muted to the point where our only connection to each other will be through technology. But then other days I see the way we can still treat "strangers" on some random app and it gives me hope that all is not lost. That sometimes we just need to rediscover that it's okay to be different or confused or that people have the same questions that I do and that if maybe I just got off my phone once in awhile I'd find people who were there the entire time to help. At the end of the day, I feel technology is advancing so quickly at times that we not only have to run to catch up on how to accurately use it, but to evolve where it doesn't consume us entirely. I don't think we're there yet, that we're caught up. But we're figuring it out.
My name is Macster and I Anonymously Posted This Message
As social media continues to destroy human interaction while also somehow encouraging more connectivity (my original blog post on the subject can be found HERE while two cool/sad videos that show the destruction of technology on social engagement can be found HERE and HERE) it has paved the way for strangers to seek validation, advice, or thoughts from other strangers. Or friends... as strangers. The results have been a mixed bag.
Let's first take a look at Whisper. Whisper is an app where you can (anonymously) post your thoughts. Anonymous users can also leave you comments. However, I had to delete Whisper after about 2 weeks when I realized that it is primarily made up of teens looking to either hook up, chat, or complain. Is our youth so troubled? Or does Whisper just lend a "voice" whereas when I was a teen, we just gossiped about these things in our inner circles or kept a journal/diary? I'm not sure which came first, Secret or Whisper, but they both act the same. They allow you to post your thoughts and get feedback without having to tie your identity to anything tangible. I look at Whisper and see Twitter, but without the character limit, the ability to make your own meme, and the ability to get interesting responses. Could Whisper actually be helpful to a teen that is depressed? Or a teen that wants to hook up? Seems like it. But as is with any anonymous platform, there are angels and there are demons. There are people that genuinely want to help and there are trolls that are willing to rip you to shreds. If you're in high school and you get bullied, do you now run to the anonymous Whisper app to share your feelings, only to get bullied there too? Who knows? I didn't stick on Whisper long enough to find out the true dichotomy of it all. It seemed like I was lurking in high school hallways and I felt dirty about it.
However, I am addicted to Secret. Secret is more of an adult version of Whisper and right now, it skews toward the tech brigade. Secret feels sort of cool because it feels like its own namesake: a secret. If you don't know about Secret, well, then you just don't know. But there goes Macster, telling everyone about it. Secret allows users to, again, anonymously post their thoughts and get back responses. Where as Whisper responses come with a photo or meme feel to it, Secret's flow more like an ongoing group text message. They have ridiculous icons that display for each user that responds to an "author's" secret. Those icons can include an owl, a spaceship, an ice cream cone, a puzzle piece, and my personal favorite... a piece of shit. Literally. Secret has taken some flak for what some feel is an elitist or exclusive vibe - as mentioned it's dominated by tech folks currently spouting so-called secrets about tech companies. It's sort of like reading a top secret Tech Crunch article and submitting comments where the writer actually responds. Secret is also getting a reputation for bullshit. Anyone can sign up and anyone can post. As far as I know, there are no verified accounts, so if I wanted to hop on and say Facebook was about to buy Secret for one trillion dollars and I work at Secret so I know these things, who's going to call me out and say it's false? Well, a lot of people will call me out. But no one will truly know if what I'm saying is true or not unless the event actually does or doesn't happen.
That being said, I still feel addicted to Secret. When I first joined, a lot of the chatter was tech related. However, as the months have gone by, I've started seeing more personal secrets posted. The way it works is that you connect to the app and it uses your contact list to figure out if your friends are on Secret or not. But YOU don't know which friends are on it. When a Secret is posted, it's defined as a post from a "Friend", "Friend of Friend", from some person some random distance away from you (for example, 1.3M away from you), or from a person from a random location (recently, a whole bunch from the United Kingdom but usually something more specific like "San Francisco" or "California"). I don't think I have a whole of friends using Secret right now but it has been interesting to see posts that come up from a "Friend" and trying to decipher who posted it. Secret doesn't really tell you how their algorithm works for dispersing secrets from non-friends but something tells me it has to do with what will get people talking and what will get a reaction from users.
The experience has been pretty interesting. I've been a part of some good conversations on Secret, all anonymous of course, relating to dating, shopping, hooking up, television shows, and general advice on life. I've also seen pretty horrific personal attacks. Again, anyone feels safe typing and posting stuff that's anonymous right? But it's been interesting. Aside from Facebook and SnapChat, Secret has probably become my 3rd most used social app. I check it more than Instragram and Twitter these days.
But what does it mean? On one hand, it's sort of nice to see these positive vibes thrown out to complete strangers. Or friends that seem like strangers since we can't identify them. Does that mean that we actually can still be decent people? That, given an arena, we're still receptive to having conversations with new people? Strangers? It's a bit baffling. We refuse to look a stranger in the eye on the MUNI but we very well could be giving them tips on how to prepare for a 3rd date via Secret.
It's a shifting social culture we live in these days. Some days I feel like all hope is lost and that human interaction will be muted to the point where our only connection to each other will be through technology. But then other days I see the way we can still treat "strangers" on some random app and it gives me hope that all is not lost. That sometimes we just need to rediscover that it's okay to be different or confused or that people have the same questions that I do and that if maybe I just got off my phone once in awhile I'd find people who were there the entire time to help. At the end of the day, I feel technology is advancing so quickly at times that we not only have to run to catch up on how to accurately use it, but to evolve where it doesn't consume us entirely. I don't think we're there yet, that we're caught up. But we're figuring it out.
My name is Macster and I Anonymously Posted This Message
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