Yik Yak has always been a popular app around campus for as long as I can remember. Granted, I've only been at Southwestern for a little less than a year and a half, but within that time it has quickly gone from 0 to 100 in how often I've seen it used and depended on by a huge chunk of the student body. Its content ranges from people trying to predict what on-campus party will be the most active to issuing daily complaints about how crappy the Commons food is. For some, it's achieved a status of high creditability in informing everyone about what's going on around campus. For others, it's simply just an app that doesn't hold any real merit or worth. And of course, you have those who have mixed feelings about it. One things for certain though, this app draws people in way or another, whether it's to comment, critique, or simply browse through.
For those of you who don't know what Yik Yak is, it is a social media app that allows people to post and view "yaks" anonymously in real time. Yaks are basically like tweets, but you don't know who's posting them and you can comment without anyone knowing your identity. Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen right? Or is its description misconstruing the benefits it offers?
The fact that Yik Yak is known for it's anonymity is only one part of the appeal. The other part comes from its convenience. You don't have to create a username or password and the fact that it's so intimate and specific to your own campus is a big part of what interests people. Whether you're waiting for your food at The Cove or sitting on the toilet in one of Prothro's luxurious bathrooms, it's so easy to find yourself scrolling and checking through the feed. Its convenience translates into being the first thing someone checks in the morning before they even get out of bed to the last thing they look at before they go to sleep.
It's hard to determine whether or not this is a good or bad thing to have around because there are so many situations in which this app can either be beneficial or very problematic.
For one, it allows people to see themselves in the posts that they view, therefore allowing them to be more open and honest with their comments. It gives them the space to relate and in this way, provokes them to give the kind of advice they'd like to hear someone else tell them. Yik Yak can be seen as a "no judgment" zone and serves as a way for people to vent about how crappy their day was or ask advice on how to work up the courage to talk to someone they like. It's given a whole new meaning to how students communicate on campus.
On the other hand, this kind of free thinking and posting can also be a bad thing. The app is so versatile in terms of content that people can find it much easier to be a more malicious and crueler version of themselves, regardless of the rules and regulations of Yik Yak. Because they don't know who's reading what they're saying, they most likely aren't going to be worried if someone gets offended. It can be seen as a tool to victimize people and spread an excessive amount of gossip around. Even though the app is constantly flooded with input and opinion, how much of this actually translates into any sort of position action being taken?
The fact of that matter is that Yik Yak has become something so unpredictable during its lifetime on campus. Some days, the posts are really lighthearted and other days, there's nothing but negativity. It can simply be seen as a visual representation of the people on our campus. We all have our good and bad days, but Yik Yak has been there to emphasize all of our feelings to the max. Personally having roommates who all have different relationships with Yik Yak, they all agree that the app isn't the issue. It's how much freedom people have to say what they think. But that boils down to whether or not we should be trying to filter this even more or let it be what it is? Even the app's intended purpose is to allow us to communicate freely, are we really doing that by relying on this app and not transferring what we get from it onto our physical interactions with each other? What fuels its existence is the people who are looking for answers and those who just want to contribute to the conversation.
There is a certain appeal with the idea of being seen without really being seen and the feeling that one gets when they see a post that could potentially be about them. Is the reason we give shout outs to people on Yik Yak but won't go up and talk to them in person saying something about how this app is changing how communication among Southwestern students is shifting? We're a small campus where everyone knows everyone but if that isn't enough leeway for us to be trusting of each other and feel really connected, is that why there is such a heavy reliance on this app? Or am I wrong and it's just a way for people to simply post something without having to worry about the aftermath of explaining why they feel a certain way? Whether it's annoying as hell or acts as a way of bringing the student body closer together, the one thing we know for sure is that Yik Yak doesn't seem like it's going away any time soon.
