Revenge app Lulu lets women rate men

You may have heard of the adage - Revenge is a dish that's best served cold – Now a new dating app Lulu is giving women a platform to do just that humiliate former boyfriends by rating them on their commitment and appearance. Here's how it works - Lulu lets women log in using their phone number and they can see men in their contacts book. They are then invited to review each man by answering multiple-choice questions about the guy's sense of humor, manners, ambition, commitment level, and appearance. Women can choose from hashtags such as #BelievesInLove and #HandyMan, which are some of the positive traits in the list, while #KnickerDropper and #MummyIssues are some of the worst.. Each man on the app is then given a rating based on their reviews and his profile comes complete with hashtags given to him by women, such as #smartissexy or #dudecancook. On the Lulu homepage, users can see men who have been recommended to them by friends, newly posted reviews, and men they have previously viewed. Guys can sign up to find out what girls think about them and get personalised feedback. Men can see their average score and which hashtags girls they know use to describe them. More than 1 million men have already signed up to get feedback from women. Whilst men can't prevent being rated, they can remove themselves if they don't like what they see.

More on the app

Speaking about the app, founder Alexandra Chong, who said she created it because 'she and her girlfriends needed it', said, '"magine you're sitting around a table with your girlfriends. The conversation flows from recent dates to career moves and dermatologist recommendations. It's honest, it's open, and it's girls-only. We created Lulu to bring those private conversations among women online and to unleash the value of girl talk. Our goal is to provide a private network for women to share their experiences and get information to make smarter decisions. Relationships are just the beginning. We've started with relationships, a critical area for all of us to share and make more informed decisions. Our goal is to expand into all areas that women care about - from careers to beauty and health. In February 2013, we launched the first version of Lulu as a private app for girls to read and create reviews of guys they know. Millions of users and billions of profile views later, we're just at the start of our journey."

However, male commentators are less than impressed.

Critics have been vocal in their opinions: one commentator on Kernel wrote: 'If I tried to do something like this for men to review women, I'd have a billion fire-breathing feminists down my neck quicker than I can say Germaine Greer.'

Another disgruntled reviewer took to Lulu's iTunes preview to write: 'Everyone deserves a new start with every relationship and this app keeps that from happening.'

Peter Lloyd, author of best-selling Stand by Your Manhood: A Game-changer for Modern Men, said, "Aside from invading privacy and inviting libellous content, this app makes the lazy assumption that men are inherently bad and women are always good – which is deluded, at best, and offensive at worst. If a bloke's app reviewed women in the same way the sisterhood would be foaming at the mouth with cries of sexism, yet here men are denigrated based on entirely subjective, and not necessarily factual, experience – and yet it's celebrated. Lulu is dressed up as a safety initiative, but it's actually just a humiliation app."

Expertspeak

Seema Hingorrany, clinical psychologist and author, too slam the app adding, "Categorically speaking such apps are just bound to further mess up with human minds,as its a breeding ground for venting out your feelings about your ex and which might be in a negative taste many times. In high probability some women are over analytical and might take this feedback or comments very seriously that might distort their perceptions .Also the reviews given by ex can be on very judgmental grounds,the same man may be rated highly by the other people in his life.Clearly this app is a venting ground,for many women,but why app,they can do the talking with their best friends or family.I also fear that women might get addicted to these apps wasting much of their precious time on unnecessary comments and judgements. Life is better than this.

I also feel these apps are unfair to lot of men out there,every one is different and so are the relationship dynamics.

What works for one doesn't work for another.