Here it is, folks. “Yelp for people” app Peeple releases today, allowing smart phone junkies to quantify the human worth of everyone they meet. Oh, joy.
It’s just as weird, but now even more irrelevant! Peeple has ditched the five star rating system, giving your review the simple choice of whether to “recommend” a person based on your experience with them. Your total recommendations translate to a “Peeple number.” The person reviewed can hide bad reviews and choose which ones to feature.
But wait, there’s more! An upcoming monthly “truth” license will nullify those changes completely, allowing customers to view all of the information on a person, hidden and slanderous or not. Yes, you can pay Peeple to get the dirt on your prospective employee, date, or whoever else you’re interested in looking up.
If social media wasn’t slimy and invasive enough already, Peeple promises to turn it up past 11 toward “Jerry Springer.” And in a culture that thrives on deciding who is problematic and who is stunning and brave, I can’t help but wonder what use Peeple will have beyond naming and shaming anyone who doesn’t tow the current socially fashionable beliefs.
As a dedicated moderate, I’m familiar with offending people on either side of the fence on most issues. Now you can tabulate exactly how awful it is that I don’t subscribe to your specific creed with an app!
But Peeple is desperate to both capitalize on their investment and still look as innocent as possible in regards to the obvious predominant use of the platform. According to their official web site, they will not tolerate “profanity, bullying … name calling, degrading comments, abuse, derogatory comments, sexual references, racism, legal references, hateful content, sexism, and other parameters.”
It sounds like an ideal space for the “social justice” community circlejerk, or for anyone who thinks that the opinions of strangers about another human being is any sort of metric for that individual’s worth. But I guess I’m being redundant.
Mark that down on my Peeple score, I guess.
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