Millennials With AskFM Trauma Are Warning Gen Z Away From Anonymous Q&A App
"as someone who had tumblr in high school i know this ends badly"
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
A new app called NGL which allows the user to send and receive anonymous messages has jumped to the #1 spot in the Apple App store. Released by a group of developers in California, the app is designed to be used in conjunction with Instagram to give young people a “fun yet safe place to express your feelings and opinions without shame”.
If this premise sounds just a little familiar, it’s because there have been a string of early 2000’s websites like Tumblr, AskFM and Live Journal that did exactly the same thing. However, instead of providing a fun yet safe place to express your feelings without shame, these platforms usually resulted in children being relentlessly cyberbullied.
Many millennials have taken to Twitter in an attempt to reach gen Z before they’re similarly traumatised by the anonymous questions app.
as someone who had tumblr in high school i know this ends badly pic.twitter.com/PE759hN0L2
— Emerald Greenslander Moon (@emeraldxmoon) June 27, 2022
amazing how many people were either not heavily using tumblr as a 17-year-old (in which case i am jealous) or have somehow emotionally recovered from the anonymous message function (in which case i am jealous)
— Alex Gallagher (@lexgallagher) June 27, 2022
you could not pay me to do the anonymous message thing on insta. I lived through 2012/2013 tumblr. I’ve done my time.
— abbey (@Iouisavontrapp) June 22, 2022
The developers of NGL swear that this time will be different, and have stated that the app uses “AI moderation” technology to block unruly users.
“We utilize deep learning and rule-based character pattern-matching algorithms to filter out harmful language and bullying,” a spokesperson for the app said.
“Our algorithm can also detect the semantic meaning of emojis and our web scraper pulls specific examples of contextual emoji use. This means we stay on-trend, we understand lingo, and we know how to filter out the bad stuff.”
that anonymous message thing is such a red flag to me lol (but I never used tumblr cos it seemed to make everyone I knew who did noticeably [more] deranged)
— Patrick Marlborough (@Cormac_McCafe) June 27, 2022
So after a generation has only just recovered from the pain anonymous messaging apps brought, why is there so much demand for a new one today?
Like the protagonist in Anton Chekov’s short story The Kiss, who is infatuated after being smooched by an unknown woman in a dark room, maybe there’s some weird fleshy link that teenagers make between anonymity and desire.
But take it from us kids, placing yourself in that dark room will seldom result in faceless displays of affection. You’re more likely to receive plain ol’ abuse.