Pencourage
Let’s be honest- have you ever lied on social media? Checking in at the favourite hotspot when really you’re sat in your room with no intention of going out. Or maybe you’re doing the weekly food shop but that’s too boring to share with friends, so you let everyone know that you’re having a ‘wonderful spending spree’ in all the overly priced clothes shops. More women are telling a few fibs on their Twitter and Facebook page, all in the aid of popularity.
A survey of 2,000 UK women carried out by OnePoll, revealed that one third of women lie about their lives or activities on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter at least once a month.
A further 24% of women admitted that they lie or exaggerate on social media between 1-3 times per month, 7% between 3-6 times and a staggeringly untruthful 1% (21 respondents) more than 25 times!
The more common thing to lie about on social media with 29% was ‘what I’m doing at the moment’. Women also feel the need to lie about how much they drink with 24% admitting to having told a white lie in the past. 21% lied about what they were doing on holiday as well as their job/career. Unashamed women even lie about their relationship status totalling to 17%.
With the release of these figures, newly launched social media website, Pencourage is a new breed of social media which ensures absolute anonymity and is designed to bridge the large gulf between what people actually say on sites like Facebook and what they really think.
It acts like an online journal, allowing subscribers to create an authentic, permanent and detailed account of their lives. Users can write what they want; from their latest affair to the boss they despise without anyone discovering their true identity, with usernames and emails being private to everyone, including the website’s staff!
PencourageTo launch the new website, Pencourage carried out a social experiment which left a clearly labelled ‘journal’ on a table at a busy coffee shop in Central London. The results were very interesting and may surprise some as three out of five people (60%) surreptitiously pick up and become engrossed in genuine, handwritten diary entries dealing with a wide range of deeply personal subjects – including losing a parent and even sex fantasies.
The explosion in anonymous apps recently proves the need for an escape from the relentless pressures to appear successful and happy on social media, where we can easily compare ourselves to others in a never-ending online one-upmanship.
Where Facebook allows us to edit our profiles, create air-brushed versions of ourselves and pressures us to keep up with others as we lay open our lives to people who know us, Pencourage fills a niche where people can be 100% honest with their thoughts knowing they are not being judged.
Based on journal entries, Pencourage demonstrates the importance of recording our daily lives in an honest way, rather than through fake statuses, and shows that no matter how sentimental or explicit users’ stories are there are thousands of people with likeminded thoughts and going through similar things.
Quotes from anonymous members of the website:
Beautiful stranger
You're tall, very tall. You're in good shape too, especially for your age. You're successful, educated, cultured, witty and yes, totally perverted. I first saw you over a year ago and was struck by how annoyingly perfect you are. I say annoyingly but instead of feeling irritated, as I normally would, I felt excited. You're confident without a trace of arrogance, you know what you like and feel comfortable with it and isn't that how everyone wants to be? I admit I'm more than a little intimidated by you but not enough to run away.
Drunk
I may be a little fuzzy right now. Talking to D and he's saying a load of stuff about how he wished we could have another chance at things. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about that. I'm glad it's past midnight and I can put this here, why does it only let you post once a day? I have too much to say! Anyway, D has been really sweet but I'm worried that feelings are becoming dredged up from the past somewhere. I emailed G's dad again, don't know if tha's a smart move or not but I'm so sick and tired of being brushed under the carpet. Can feel myself building up to a hyper episode? the only thing guaranteed to bring me out of it is incredibly rough sex. I'm hoping with all my heart that I'm not on a high when D visits. He's talking a lot about how
For more information visit www.pencourage.com