A free application called “Peeple,” described as “Yelp for people” by founders Julia Cordray and Nicole McCullagh, will come out late November,
Instead of signing up for the app yourself, someone else creates a profile for you using your Facebook account and phone number. Both of these are required to make the page and are subsequently needed to write a review.
The reviews are based on a zero-to-five star rating scale and are divided into three categories based on your relationship with the reviewer. The relationship categories include personal, professional and dating, and all can be positive or negative.
Positive reviews of individuals are immediately posted and made public on the site, while negative reviews go through a 48-hour waiting period in the person’s inbox before being posted. Active members on the app are given a chance to work out the problem with the other person or comment on the negative review once it is posted.
If someone has a page created for him and never joins the app, only positive reviews can be posted and no one can see the negative reviews. All posts are attributed and none can be marked as anonymous.
There are two problems with this novel idea. First, users will undoubtedly submit negative posts, leading to more self-esteem issues in society. Second, many of the positive reviews will be fake, resulting from favors (i.e. If you give me a five-star rating, I’ll give you the same.)
Unsurprisingly, there was an incredible amount of backlash against the app and founders when it was announced.
A main issue is the lack of consent involved; users can have pages created for them without an option to opt out of it. Internet users went as far as to post on Cordray’s social media accounts, ironically rating her using the five-star system that she created.
To me, the most shocking aspect of the app is that it was created as a positivity site. Cordray’s idea was to spread love by showing people the positive things others have to say about them.
After all of the open hate for the app including death threats to the co-founders, the app’s website, Facebook page and Twitter page were all temporarily shut down. Cordray proposed a new idea for the app after such a strong resistance against the initial concept.
Now, Peeple really will be exclusively positive. In a press release, Cordray said users can no longer be on the platform without consent, and individuals cannot make negative comments anymore. People must approve each review of themselves first before it is made public.
While I am still disgusted by the idea of a “Yelp for people” app, I also find Peeple rather pointless. Why would someone take a profile seriously if they know they can only look at positive reviews of the person?
We will have to see what the future holds for Peeple, but I have a hunch that the founders will be very disappointed with the results.
