It seems like every few months a new app or game rolls through Facebook and swallows up your feed, and the newest craze is an anonymous question app called Profound.me. It allows your Facebook friends to send you anonymous questions or comments. While it can be a fun way for friends to shower you in love, it isn't all fun and games. So, should you jump on the Profoundly.me bandwagon?
Profoundly.me isn't right for everyone
The point of Profoundly.me's anonymous messages is that your friends can send you messages they might be too shy to ask in person. That's the nature of anonymous messages. But it doesn't take into account how sideways anonymity can go.
When I signed up for Profoundly, it took roughly 10 mins for the first creepy message to come rolling into my inbox, and I'm definitely not the only one. While many of my male friends received interesting messages, many of the women I know were reposting creepy, harassing or disturbing messages. Profoundly.me does include a way to report these messages, but you can only do that one at a time.
What makes it worse, is that only your Facebook friends can send you questions, which means you definitely know the person hiding behind anonymity. You've chosen to be connected to the person who might be making lewd overtures that they never would have undertaken if face to face with you. If your feed is made up of people you love, and trust then you might be in the clear. If, on the other hand, you use your Facebook as a catch-all for acquaintances and people you've met, then getting weird, creepy, or harassing messages might not be a long shot.
Should you use Profoundly.me?
This is a question that every person really has to make for themselves. It definitely depends on how you use Facebook, whether you think you can trust the people on your friend's list to not be creepy jerks, and whether you like to receive anonymous messages.
If you got a lot of unpleasant messages while using other anonymous messaging apps, or a lot of drama floating around in your life it might not be the best call. Likewise, if you have a lot of exes, or friends that you're on the out with, it might be better to stay away from Profoundly.me. Much like the Sarahah app that was floating around in 2017 and 2018, the ability to send nasty messages is very easy and anonymity makes folks far bolder than they might be otherwise.
Profoundly.me can be a fun way to have fun with your friends.
Every message you report does get removed from your question list, it doesn't lessen the impact of seeing that question on your phone. Profoundly.me does include a pretty thorough code of conduct in their terms of service, but it's unclear how well they enforce it. Which means one person could send plenty of nasty messages before being blocked.
However, if you know everyone on your friends list, then this can be a fun app to share with friends. You might find out someone has a crush on you, or just get overwhelmed with positivity and loving messages. Even if you aren't sure who sent them.
So long as you go into using the app with your eyes open as to what you might find, it can be a fun way to burn off some boredom and have fun with your friends. If it crosses a line, it's easy to deactivate from within your Facebook game settings.
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