New dating twist: Have your avatars meet first
SEATTLE -- A new app brings a twist to meeting someone new -- let your avatars meet first.
The digital date could prove to be a safe introduction.
Location-based social discovery is a growing trend to find new people and businesses.
Co-founders Benjamin Liu and James Sun decided to take an anonymous angle to the idea with their Anomo app that lets you find and meet people nearby, anonymously without revealing who you really are at first.
"It's patent pending right now which is a process of taking a real profile and put an avatar in front of it and then allowing you to reveal pieces of your real self," Sun said. "A lot of people on Facebook and Foursquare -- they don't want to check in any more because they have so many friends -- even strangers that will know where they are at."
So I put it to the test on Capitol Hill, to see what I could find and if it really works.
You need Facebook account to log in -- that's how the app assumes you're a real person. After choosing my avatar, the app showed avatars of people who where nearby.
After a few minutes, I chatted with six or seven people -- three of them were from the company, a couple of them, who knows?
Anomo is only a couple of weeks old, so the universe of people using it is small but I started a chat with a user who was nearby. Unlike the all or nothing approach with sites like Facebook, I only revealed to her what I wanted her to know. We agreed to meet in 15 minutes.
After comparing how well our avatars looked to our real selves, we compared experiences.
"Well, I've only had it a couple of days so I've been trying it out mostly but I do like it," Elaine Cho said.
I then met Elaine an hour after I started texting people and revealing myself.
"I like the concept behind it," she said, "because you can choose to reveal what you want to reveal... You do have to go beyond the avatar that's been picked, their interest, their tags and how they describe themselves."
That's how a digital date begins now a days -- let the avatar do the talking first.
Anomo is free and is available on both the iTunes and Google Play app store.
The digital date could prove to be a safe introduction.
Location-based social discovery is a growing trend to find new people and businesses.
Co-founders Benjamin Liu and James Sun decided to take an anonymous angle to the idea with their Anomo app that lets you find and meet people nearby, anonymously without revealing who you really are at first.
"It's patent pending right now which is a process of taking a real profile and put an avatar in front of it and then allowing you to reveal pieces of your real self," Sun said. "A lot of people on Facebook and Foursquare -- they don't want to check in any more because they have so many friends -- even strangers that will know where they are at."
So I put it to the test on Capitol Hill, to see what I could find and if it really works.
You need Facebook account to log in -- that's how the app assumes you're a real person. After choosing my avatar, the app showed avatars of people who where nearby.
After a few minutes, I chatted with six or seven people -- three of them were from the company, a couple of them, who knows?
Anomo is only a couple of weeks old, so the universe of people using it is small but I started a chat with a user who was nearby. Unlike the all or nothing approach with sites like Facebook, I only revealed to her what I wanted her to know. We agreed to meet in 15 minutes.
After comparing how well our avatars looked to our real selves, we compared experiences.
"Well, I've only had it a couple of days so I've been trying it out mostly but I do like it," Elaine Cho said.
I then met Elaine an hour after I started texting people and revealing myself.
"I like the concept behind it," she said, "because you can choose to reveal what you want to reveal... You do have to go beyond the avatar that's been picked, their interest, their tags and how they describe themselves."
That's how a digital date begins now a days -- let the avatar do the talking first.
Anomo is free and is available on both the iTunes and Google Play app store.
It has nothing to do with confidence and growing balls..although some people might find it useful because they are shy but for others who simply don't have a lot of time..they can connect with people efficiently without wasting a lot of time. Funny how when a new gadget comes out people immediately bash it without having a full understanding of what it does...when it's probably those exact people that use it the most :)
How about grow a pair of balls, get off the damn computer and go meet real people using your real human being self? Good lord what the heck is happening to us?
You don't have to just use this app for dating..that's the cool thing. This helps bridge communication between you and a complete stranger for different purposes..whether it's dating, business networking, or you just wanna chat with someone about a similar experience you both are sharing..like eating at the same restaurant and whether you should order the lamb chops or not. How many of you would find it awkward to just go up to someone you don't know and start talking to them? Exactly- most of you!
"A lot of people on Facebook and Foursquare -- they don't want to check in any more because they have so many friends -- even strangers that will know where they are at."Â
Don't update, and use the unfriend button. I can just see us now--or maybe I do--all standing around in a dead silent room, (and at work, in the car, at the store, at home and everywhere else) ignoring each other while the fingers move
While dating is a component, Anomo is really focused on meeting people and making connections as a whole. Â Imagine going to a business conference where you can see the tags of people around you, and be able to maximize your limited time networking with other like minded individuals. Â Or sitting in a lecture at UW, discussing with other students around you, finding study groups, and where the next party is!
seems pretty cool to me. Â everyone talks about personality being what matters most and this gives me a nice each way to determine it.Â
Great, now even MORE people will be bumping into each other like myopic carnival cars because they can't take their face away from their little glowing gadget long enough to watch where they're going. "Oh. Excuse me, I'm sorry. I was hooking my cartoon self up with this real cute cartoon chick that I met on a cartoon playground. Didn't mean to smash your eggs"Â Pathetic what our society is becoming.
Sure. Cuz everybody tells the truth in an online dating profile, right?
This is right up there with that company that developed the public records search app and then marketted it to women as a dating 'fear-wear app'.
How did we *ever* procreate without all this electronic help?
@svensson procreate? There's an app for that.
This will work great in the most passive-aggressive city in the country, Seattle.
WoW!
Has society realy become that ignorant?
Epically hosed has taken on a new meaning.
Due to the Seattle Freeze, this app makes sense. In normal society, however, it's pretty lame.
And people wonder why no one has any actual social skills anymore.