–
–
A new app which launched yesterday is available that promises to help put a stop to bullying through social media. The company is called “Hyper.”
Will you offer us a hand? Every gift, regardless of size, fuels our future.
Your critical contribution enables us to maintain our independence from shareholders or wealthy owners, allowing us to keep up reporting without bias. It means we can continue to make Jewish Business News available to everyone.
You can support us for as little as $1 via PayPal at [email protected].
Thank you.
On the surface, Hyper seems like just another Instagram or Twitter. But its makers promise that it will make it easier for users to protect themselves from unwanted attention.
How?
It is divided into various genres. So on Hyper a user can make posts directly to the areas that interest him, such as sports and music. Everyone in that area is notified of the post.
This is in contrast to other platforms where a posting appears under a user’s personal profile. With Hyper only the people in the specified group will see your posting.
The company’s co-creator, Dan Frieber, told Think Progress, “If you look at the social networks that dominate that sphere, they’re all follower based. And that’s fine for people who want to build audiences around their content. But they become the same audience. Do people want to let the content speak for itself or do people want to engage with the content more than the people?”
Hyper users will also give instant feedback and vote on things that people share.
“The system of voting that we have actually takes care of the bullying comments, and if it gets out of control, we get rid of it, ” explained Frieber.
“You hear about Yik Yak, you hear about Whisper and their bullying problem. Yik Yak deals with bullying because of what the audience is: It’s geo-based so there’s shared knowledge between users, like around schools. With Twitter and Instagram, the audience is your followers.”
But is Hyper unique enough to distinguish itself from the already very established competition. This new company may fall into the “too little too late” category alongside all the attempts at new web browsers and search engines that failed to compete with google.
It seems that all Facebook and Instagram will need to do is allow for closed and/or anonymous groups where only invited members may post content and comment on other’s posts.
Oh wait, they already do, don’t they?
