Reports have surfaced overnight from the New York Times, that Facebook is preparing to launch a new standalone app that will allow you to interact with others by not using your real name.
Unnamed sources cited by the New York Times, claims that Facebook has been working on this project for close to a year. The project is being led by Josh Miller, a product manager at Facebook who joined the company when it acquired Branch, a start-up which focused on products that fostered small, online discussion groups.
According to these unnamed sources, Miller and the rest of his team have been working on the new product in its different forms for the last year. The app, will allow Facebook users to use multiple pseudonyms to openly discuss the different things they talk about on the Internet or topics of discussion which they may not be comfortable connecting to their real names.
So what does this mean for Facebook? Well nothing really at this stage. Its main site will remain your online identity, and to map out the connections you have to other friends and family, both on and offline. However it is unsure how the new app if anything will interact with the main Facebook site or app. it is also unclear if the app will allow anonymous photo sharing, or how friend interactions and existing friend connections will work.
Unfortunately, the report doesn’t give any details of how the app will work or what it will look like, the unnamed sources did advise that the app could be released to the public within the coming weeks.
Facebook for its part, hasn’t confirmed anything about the new app and is remaining tight lipped at this stage. The questions that now remains are when will Facebook officially launch the new app and when they do, would you consider downloading it?
I’ll stick to 4chan for anonymity thanks.
Just because your name will remain anonymous, I would have concerns over security given the way Facebook harvests your personal data at present. I can’t see what use the app is anyway so it probably won’t be an issue for me!
Exactly. Just by using this ‘anonymous’ app on the same device that you use or have previously used would be enough for facebook to establish a link and identify you.