It was going to happen eventually, but that still doesn’t make it any less shocking – there’s an app readying for launch that will allow you to review other people, like a Yelp but for humans.
The app, titled Peeple, is slated for launch in November according to co-founder and chief executive Julia Cordray. It will allow users to review everyone they come into contact with, be it exes, colleagues, waiters, neighbors – if you know their name, you can rate them on a star level from 1 to 5 on the app.
The most questionable aspect of the app, however, is that it allows users to upload profiles for other people, meaning that even if you don’t sign up to the app yourself, you may learn that you have your own Peeple account that people are actively rating. Peeple has assured those who have rightly criticized this feature that only positive reviews will be able to be posted for “unclaimed” accounts, and a statement posted to their Facebook page suggests that they have acknowledged that it’s probably not a good idea to let everyone create accounts for one another.
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The app is inevitably garnering a huge amount of criticism online, and some have even pointed to it being a hoax, but according to The Washington Post the company’s shares have been valued at $7.6 million, meaning that rather than a prank actively designed to create controversy on the Internet, it seems that this is unfortunately a very real app that will soon allow users to more effectively bully and berate people online (and occasionally give them a positive review, of course.)
The founders and creators of Peeple discussing the app.
It shouldn’t need to be said, but treating real humans as though they are blu-rays, and pointing out their positive and negative aspects for everyone with a Facebook account to see, is gross and it’s questionable whether or not Facebook will continue to actually support it given the vast amount of negative feedback, with the app becoming one of the top Twitter trending topics following the first reports of its existence last night.
Yelp has ran into its own problems in the past, with companies admonishing the site due to it giving its users an immense amount of freedom, granting them the power to effectively ruin a company’s business. One such instance of Yelp being used out of spite was when a Google Glass user was asked to remove her glasses in a restaurant due to it making other guests feel uncomfortable, only for her to then rally a large number of fellow Google Glass users to leave negative feedback on the restaurant’s Yelp page, thus harming their business. Imagine this type of scenario, only instead of your place of employment being targeted, it’s instead your personality and appearance?
It remains to be seen whether this backlash will harm Peeple’s chances of securing further financial backing, but at the moment it’s certainly making headlines – unfortunately, it’s for all the wrong reasons.
