Unvarnished: Website Lets You Review People (And Trash Them)
Unvarnished, a website that has launched in beta, lets you review people you know.
Got a gripe about your manager's sloppy emails? Know dirt about a former classmate's past? Have something you want to share about an employee's good (or terrible) workplace habits? Unvarnished, which has been described as a sort of Yelp-meets-LinkedIn, will let you share all this and more--anonymously.
CNET explains that its function is to, "let anyone create a profile about you and then post "reviews" about your job performance, management style, reputation, behavioral quirks, and so on. Or, put another way, it'll let co-workers or relative strangers subject you to anonymous and potentially defamatory attacks that are completely outside your control, can't be removed or edited, and are ripe for abuse."
As CNET's tone suggests, reviewers' ability to post criticisms and compliments anonymously, as well as the people's inability to delete or vote on negative posts about themselves, have elicited controversy over the site.
TechCrunch calls it a "clean, well-lighted place for defamation." Craigslist founder Craig Newmark says it is "a reputation site worth looking at."
However, Gigaom points out that users can recruit friends to post positive reviews about them on the site--effectively enabling people to "crowdsource" their reputations.
Daily Finance notes Unvarnished's co-founder Peter Kazanjy thinks that "Unvarnished won't turn into a "burn book" of unhinged nastiness. Rather, he thinks that lots of positive commenters will come forward and that the site's profiles will reflect the true beliefs of friends and colleagues."
Watch an interview with Unvarnished's Kazanjy below.
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First Posted: 06/05/10 06:12 AM ET Updated: 05/25/11 05:05 PM ET