A new smartphone app called “Jodel” provides a new form of communication among students.
“Discover the hottest news, events, stories and jokes in the community around you! On Jodel, you can post messages and photos known as “Jodels” in real-time,” as stated in Jodel’s description on Apple’s App Store.
The app provides an anonymous public messaging platform to those within a 10 km radius where users can post pictures and brief texts.
“It’s good because it’s a way for people to communicate on a larger scale,” Ryan Rogers, a senior studying Business Management, said.
Rogers found out about the app from a flyer in the Business Building. He has only used the app a little bit to advertise for his delivery service, “Munchtime.”
“It’s alright,” Rogers said. “Kind of like a replica of ‘Yik Yak.’”
Yik Yak was a similar app that launched in 2013 and had a quick rise in popularity, but was discontinued in 2015. Jodel has its differences from the Yik Yak app.
“Though its remnant of Yik-Yak’s early days in terms of functionality, there are a few things that very much set it apart,” a Jodel representative said. “Probably the most important differences are that we take content moderation very seriously and always aim to keep the community welcoming and supportive.”
One of the differences is that Jodel does not allow people to post pictures from their camera role, only original pictures taken of real-time situations. Representatives of Jodel state that the app has seen success with these changes in various locations around the world where it has been introduced.
“For instance, in a college town in Finland, students use Jodel to create daily treasure hunts where they hide candy and gifts around campus, post a photo of its location and let other students search,” a Jodel representative stated.
Despite differences like these, other students are not too sure of the Jodel app, which has been introduced on two other college campuses in the U.S., Wyoming being the third.
“It doesn’t seem like a good thing to me,” Oakley Cathcart, a third-year student studying Business Economics, said. “Just from looking at the posts that they had advertised on their flyer. Especially the one that’s talking about like ‘oh you should buy girls fishbowls not flowers,’ why would you want to be getting people to participate in that type of thing?”
Cathcart doesn’t feel like Jodel is a healthy media platform.
“It’s bringing unnecessary gossip or drama into social events,” Cathcart said.
Jodel has guidelines for what and how to post, most of the power of what stays and what goes belongs to the users.
“I’m sure some people will use it in a positive way but there will always be people to abuse the power of anonymity,” Rogers said.
