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Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

zonemessenger.com

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Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#91

Post by b3n »

CraigJPerry wrote: post #40
JulianMorrison wrote: post #39

Anonymous messaging has proven in practise to be full of cruel gossip, hate speech, and bullying. I can't see a positive use for it, really.

It's also proven to be full of insight, creativity and honesty. As a pretty active consumer of anonymous content, I'd hate to be without it now. Not to undermine your valid points but it is a pull medium, not a push. You're free not to consume. I expect twitter to end up in 2 tiers, the verified default view and the anonymous dark forest (what we have today) you can opt into.

Out of curiosity, where do you consume your insightful anonymous content?

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#92

Post by JoeDaDude »

SamBam wrote: post #65
mgallowa wrote: post #61

I founded an anonymous social media platform in the past. It can be a real pain because once identity/accountability is removed, people tend to act very poorly. On paper, I like your idea of helping people to form risk-free connections, but it is very possible for your platform to spin out of your control. The small radius location nature of your app will likely mean a lot of negative press and/or police inquiries ab…

Indeed. Yik Yak is a huge platform for bullies: https://www.google.com/search?q=yik+yak+bullying Basically, if you use this near a school, then the school will be the main topic of conversation. And in that case (assuming students using this), half the conversations may be "So-and-so is a ____" Is there any thought of community moderation?

Yik Yak removed user anonymity in recent releases. All users now have a unique handle.

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#93

Post by sjm »

anotheryou wrote: post #26

Can you make the zone adaptive so there are always at least a few people there?

Funny that you mention this, as I've literally just submitted this exact app to Apple and should hopefully be launching in the next few days.

The app is called hoody (https://hoody.im) and I can't wait to post it to HN. I was actually a bit bummed to see this as I figured they had _just_ beaten me to the post, but in fact our apps are slightly different.

It's anonymous, with auto-generated nicknames as well, but the chat areas are dynamic based on activity in your area. So if no one is using it, it goes worldwide, and shrinks down as people around you are active (country level, city level, suburb), down to a minimum of around 700 metres.

Look for it on HN in the next couple days! ;)

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#94

Post by fatdog »

mgallowa wrote: post #61

I founded an anonymous social media platform in the past. It can be a real pain because once identity/accountability is removed, people tend to act very poorly. On paper, I like your idea of helping people to form risk-free connections, but it is very possible for your platform to spin out of your control. The small radius location nature of your app will likely mean a lot of negative press and/or police inquiries ab…

Authorities of all sorts love the bully narrative because it legitimizes their demands for compliance. Social media is undermining to them because people don't want to be supervised.

The real reason social media sites die without moderation is not because it alienates people who take bullying, it is that when there is no way to become a moderator, people seek status and power elsewhere. Reddit survives because it is a status pyramid scheme. HN survives because of similar aspiration to be seen as that smart person in front of a VC audience, a kind of Enders Game fantasy.

Facebook and Twitter are waning not because of trolls, but because they have signaled a nannying supervisory role that reduces overall user optionality, and takes away the thing that drew people in in the first place: Hope.

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#96

Post by reledi »

theveloped wrote: post #2

Let me know what you guys think. The app was made to get people talking again to the people around them. I threw in automatically generated anonymous nicknames to lower the initial barrier a bit. Any advise on how to market/keep people engaged are most welcome.

I don't have an iPhone to try it out, so a few questions.

1. Do you need to "log in" to use it? Or can it be used without an account?

2. Can you have hidden/secret conversations? That is, the conversation isn't easily observable by everyone within 1km?

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#97

Post by theveloped »

mgallowa wrote: post #61

I founded an anonymous social media platform in the past. It can be a real pain because once identity/accountability is removed, people tend to act very poorly. On paper, I like your idea of helping people to form risk-free connections, but it is very possible for your platform to spin out of your control. The small radius location nature of your app will likely mean a lot of negative press and/or police inquiries ab…

Thanks for the heads up. I was hoping this would be an ideal system to have the community moderate/flag messages/users.

Being a little paranoid about privacy myself I tried to build the platform with as little logging etc. as possible. This of course also makes it harder to avoid misuse of the platform.

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#98

Post by [deleted] »

A1kmm wrote: post #34

If it is exactly 1 km you could triangulate to find someone's location. A program to do that would do a bisection search along a line (faking coordinates for the location of the device) to find the point on the line where you transition to seeing the person's messages. Then, repeat along other two lines in different directions. Each transition point gives a circle of 1 km radius on which the person is present, and th…

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#99

Post by dcre »

fatdog wrote: post #94
mgallowa wrote: post #61

I founded an anonymous social media platform in the past. It can be a real pain because once identity/accountability is removed, people tend to act very poorly. On paper, I like your idea of helping people to form risk-free connections, but it is very possible for your platform to spin out of your control. The small radius location nature of your app will likely mean a lot of negative press and/or police inquiries ab…

Authorities of all sorts love the bully narrative because it legitimizes their demands for compliance. Social media is undermining to them because people don't want to be supervised. The real reason social media sites die without moderation is not because it alienates people who take bullying, it is that when there is no way to become a moderator, people seek status and power elsewhere. Reddit survives because it is…

I don't think Facebook is waning.

Re: Show HN: Anonymous messaging with a 1km radius

#100

Post by fatdog »

dcre wrote: post #99
fatdog wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Authorities of all sorts love the bully narrative because it legitimizes their demands for compliance. Social media is undermining to them because people don't want to be supervised. The real reason social media sites die without moderation is not because it alienates people who take bullying, it is that when there is no way to become a moderator, people seek status and power elsewhere. Reddit survives because it is…

I don't think Facebook is waning.

read reports of rate of user growth slowing down, teenagers switching to other platforms, and my own view that it is a millennial demographic phenomenon, like a pop genre.

They can make more money, but imho it will be through value added services on their graph and service diversification, not on user growth against todays advertising model.

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