
Facebook acquires anonymous teen compliment app tbh, will let it run - coloneltcb
https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/16/facebook-acquires-anonymous-teen-compliment-app-tbh-will-let-it-run/
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quadrangle
This isn't improving mental health, it's just destroying it in a different way
than negativity destroys it.

Sure, we all want social approval, but this sort of thing is about creating a
system to depend on. It seems designed just like other social media, aiming to
cause people to feel a _need_ for TBH approval and a social _obligation_ to
participate in showing your approval of others.

People should drop the entire concept of caring about aspects of their
identify as fixed traits such as those TBH focuses on. Having a nice smile (or
not) or being viewed as the most talented at whatever skill are traits that
are phrased as fixed judgments of a person.

Instead, we need to focus on acknowledging success for particular actions and
recognizing the potential for growth in areas where we can improve. See (e.g.)
[http://malcolmocean.com/2014/07/growth-mindset-
reframing/](http://malcolmocean.com/2014/07/growth-mindset-reframing/)

TBH is more likely to lead to dysfunctional fixed mindsets than to inspire
anyone to do anything good or feel good about themselves in a healthy growth-
focused way.

~~~
atomical
Should self worth be tied to success at all?

~~~
quadrangle
Well, a basic sense of dignity as a human being should certainly not be tied
to success. But the important point is that the best way to think about
failure and success is as simply facts about what happened. You failed. You
succeeded.

The problems with fixed mindset relates to treating success as an _indication_
of your self-worth. Doing that means that failure is a rejection of your self-
worth. That leads to people fearing failure and thus avoiding taking on risky
challenges they may fail at. And yet growth comes from being willing to fail
and to persist in the face of failure etc.

If I fail at expressing myself clearly in a comment like this, it's better to
acknowledge it and think "that comment failed" and think about how to succeed
better next time… (I could go on, but I'm not going to invest more time in
this comment right now)

~~~
jpttsn
As I see it, your options are fear of failure, fear of success, fear
regardless of success/failure, or fearlessness regardless of success/failure.
Fear of failure seems like a fantastic choice.

~~~
Anderkent
Why does it seem like a fantastic choice? Significant fear of failure leads to
not attempting things in the first place; that doesn't sound fantastic.

~~~
jpttsn
Sure it does! I could attempt to fly every time I see an open window. It’s
wonderful to fear failure.

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quintin
Its time to remind everyone that Facebook owns Onavo[1][2] and before any
investor realizes, will pick up a product that hits their metrics threshold
and buy them out.

[1] [https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebooks-onavo-gives-social-
me...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebooks-onavo-gives-social-media-firm-
inside-peek-at-rivals-users-1502622003)

[2]
[https://twitter.com/dhh/status/900893798821134336?lang=en](https://twitter.com/dhh/status/900893798821134336?lang=en)

~~~
htormey
This is a really good point. I don't think this is necessarily a bad
acquisition at all. Onavo is basically Facebooks eye of sauron:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onavo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onavo)

TBH has been in the top 10 free apps for a few weeks now. FB has a good track
record of buying small teams with good engagement numbers and letting them run
themselves (Whatsapp/Instagram).

I'm sure Facebook looked at their numbers via Onavo and decided they were on a
pretty good trajectory.

Also, it should be noted that TBH doesn't even have an Android app yet.

The question now is will TBH turn out to be more of a draw with friends (flash
in the pan game) or have staying power like Bitmoji does.

Bitmoji was purchased by Snap Inc for around 100 million about a year ago. It
has managed to consistently stay in the top 10 free apps since then:

[https://techcrunch.com/2016/03/29/snapmoji/](https://techcrunch.com/2016/03/29/snapmoji/)

~~~
ghostly_s
> TBH has been in the top 10 free apps for a few weeks now. FB has a good
> track record of buying small teams with good engagement numbers and letting
> them run themselves (Whatsapp/Instagram).

I can't comment on Whatsapp but I don't think this is an accurate description
of Instagram. It took them a while, sure, but today they are most definitely
asserting their control as overlords of Instagram even if they 'run
themselves'.

~~~
htormey
Oh so how do you know that? Did they publish some article stating a change in
control?

~~~
w-ll
Anecdotal: Last Instagram update started giving me notifications from Facebook
not related to my Ig posts.

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jordan801
I feel like the subtle pseudo-gratification from this app is not going to make
teens happier. Rather, they'll subconsciously realize that it's all a facade
and it'll make them even less happy.

We're going to keep creating this crap, I am sure, but lets just not label it
with, "We're trying to make the world better". You're an app company, not a
collective of teen health PHDs seeking to thwart teen's hormonal, depressive
tenancies.

~~~
Spivak
Less cynically, you might be right, but I hope it actually works. There's
nothing wrong with trying to make something positive. There's
[http://www.rethinkwords.com/](http://www.rethinkwords.com/) which actually
has data backing up that it works.

~~~
whipoodle
I don’t think the point GP is making is cynical. I think what GP is talking
about is cynical.

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faded242
My middle school aged daughter wanted this installed on her phone the other
day. I said no way. The last thing she needs her electronic devices doing is
serving up tinder for kids, leaving her obsessing over popularity contests, or
another avenue for anonymous bullying.

~~~
pwaai
I'm appalled that everybody carries around a real time yearbook. High school
seems to never end. I shudder the effect this app will have on the self esteem
of the user.

We didn't know tobacco was harmful back when everybody was doing it. We didn't
know cocaine was harmful back when it was the thing. We also don't know about
the sort of damage and stress of the human psyche with these engineered
digital toxins.

~~~
supernumerary
I think that for America, and white america in particular life's non plus
ultra is senior year of high school. At the very least country music seems to
paint this picture.

~~~
handsomechad
what does non plus ultra mean? i looked it up but couldn't find a clear
definition

contextually it seems like it means "peak"?

~~~
edflsafoiewq
It means "nothing further beyond"; life never moves beyond the senior year of
high school.

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unpwn
Nice write up on focusing on "postivity focus" and "helping teens' mental
health" but seems like just another app training teens to seek social
validation via an app...

~~~
stevenwoo
I am trying to figure out why Facebook didn't just clone the features and add
anonymous friend polls to their app/website (which I assume is definitely
going to happen now in spite of the press release.)

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adventured
If you mean clone the features over to Facebook.... It's because Facebook is
unpopular with teens. That's a demographic Facebook has increasingly lost as
it pertains to usage (they still sign-up, because of the vague pressure that
everyone must have an account). If it weren't for Instagram, they'd be in deep
shit with people under ~25 and very susceptible to being replaced or having
their monopoly fractured (the 16-25 group would seed competitors, one of which
would eventually kill Facebook starting from that base and progressing up).

~~~
stevenwoo
It seems to me that Facebook has the age data and could have just targeted
those age groups exclusively with the feature, and hidden it from the _uncool_
age groups. Maybe they tried it and it didn't get any traction and that's why
they did the purchase.

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PinkMilkshake
This could be a data mining wet dream. They have found a way to make filling
out surveys addictive. It seems all you had to do was present it in a fun way
and make sure the surveys are about other people. I wouldn't be surprised if
the questions start shifting towards things that could be used to market to
people. Imagine if all of John Smiths friends say he is "Most likely to skip
work to play a videogame". It wouldn't matter if John had ever mentioned video
games on his profile.

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minimaxir
Twitter has been justifiably snarky about the news that Facebook bought
_another_ short-term viral app for the users: “this smacks of engagement
desperation”

[https://twitter.com/mikeisaac/status/920021423703310336](https://twitter.com/mikeisaac/status/920021423703310336)

~~~
734786710934
The same people said the same thing about Instagram and WhatsApp.

~~~
stevenwoo
I thought one of the main things about Whatsapp was the huge audience and the
demographics of that audience skewed young, and this app while not quite the
install base size of Whatsapp/Instagram is ppoular with young folks. The
demographics is the one they teach in Psych 101 as the most crucial point at
which marketing can influence lifelong brand choices. The tweet snark seems to
miss the point altogether.

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cfitz
From a capitalistic point-of-view, congrats to Midnight Labs for successfully
repeatedly pivoting until something stuck. From a cultural point-of-view, I'm
afraid for my (future) kids.

~~~
aqsheehy
Anonymous compliments seem nice to me, am I missing something?

~~~
quadrangle
You're missing very nearly everything.

Even anonymous compliments are not just nice. They can be awkward or add to
self-consciousness or to self-absorbed narcissism. It all depends on the
details. A sincere, meaningful compliment about some actual achievement (as
opposed to some random trait that is fixed) can be wonderful. TBH has none of
that though. But TBH does have a lot of bad things that normal anonymous
compliments never have.

When anonymous compliments require signing up for a service just to get
anonymous compliments from your peers with the understanding that you do the
same, you create an entire social context where all the benefits of an
actually natural complement are eliminated and replaced with an addictive,
data-mining and actually negative for mental health situation.

~~~
aqsheehy
Can you recommend another way I could leave an anonymous compliment?

~~~
dynamoa
Leave a note, send a letter, send an email, leave a comment anonymously

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NumberCruncher
>> “If we’re improving the mental health of millions of teens, that’s a
success to us.”

Amplifying attention bitching is a good deed again.

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dizzystar
This app reminds me of the Black Mirror episode "Nosedive."

I know I shouldn't be so down on this.

~~~
quadrangle
Why shouldn't you be down on it? TBH, from the description in the article, is
horrible and deserves being seen negatively.

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ionised
Seems like a step towards that Black Mirror episode, _Nosedive_ ;

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosedive)

I don't see this as a positive app at all., It's just reinforcing shallow and
unhealthy behaviour.

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perydell
This app held the attention of the kids in the middle school and high school
near me for about 7 days. Then they got bored of it and all stopped playing.

~~~
cwkoss
Sounds like founders made a good call on acquisition :-P

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Invictus0
A hundred million here, a hundred million there: who cares? It's way cheaper
for FB to buy up these small social media companies than wait around until
they become big competitors. If it fails, so what? It's worth it to ensure
their market dominance.

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Sir_Cmpwn
When are we going to have a legislative crack down on psychologically abusive
software? It's not just this, though it's a particularly egregious example.
Facebook itself is a huge online predator.

~~~
musage
No thanks, people like their abuse systematic and shiny. When everybody
becomes more pathological, nobody becomes more pathological.

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riot504
Want to know what will improve teen health, going back to not having to worry
what every other teen thinks about you. I remember when my parents attempted
to give me a cell-phone at 17. I politely said no thank you, I don't want you
being able to contact me at anytime. I want to be in the moment. I didn't take
photos or update anything in real-time, I didn't update people after the fact
either, we just lived in the moment then moved on. Mind you this was 18 - 20
years ago.

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qume
The SEC regulates anticompetitive moves. Sounds like we need a new body which
regulates creepy predator companies like facebook going after kids.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The SEC regulates anticompetitive moves.

Actually, that's the FTC.

The SEC regulates securities trading.

> Sounds like we need a new body which regulates creepy predator companies
> like facebook going after kids.

With appropriate statutory authority, that sounds like it would _also_ be a
good fit for the FTC. Even if new law is needed, why a new regulatory body?

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vit05
I was working on an app that used a lot of emojis. And searching for similar
design app, tbh came to my attention. It was really similar to what I was
doing in term of design using strong colors and a big emoji. But the idea was
totally different.

Teens and Kids really love this combination. And the app is simple and fast,
It is like play a game. You could imagine kids playing and smiling.

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mtgx
Yeah, I'm sure it will maintain the same separation as it did with
WhatsApp...oh wait, no it didn't. This "anonymous" app won't be anonymous much
longer. And it will probably happen at least a year before they actually
announce it, just as it did with WhatsApp.

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diogenescynic
Big freaking deal... This is simply PR for all the nastiness they've released
into the world and damage to our democracy. The world would be better off
without Facebook.

~~~
quadrangle
I think you miss the point. It's newsworthy, not positive. This is not news
about FB doing something good, this is news about FB continuing to harm the
world still further. Of course, the world would be better of without FB and
also without TBH.

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Margaret-mayu
？

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mannigfaltig
Eww.

