--- title: Lulu Launches Truth Bombs: Male and Female Messaging description: The once women-only app is doing some serious male outreach. canonical: https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/ author: Laura Stampler article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-22T12:04:27.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:13:57.209Z og:title: Lulu Now Lets Men and Women Communicate: Here Are The Strange Things Dudes Are Asking og:description: The once women-only app is doing some serious male outreach og:url: https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltae32c844f5b5514b/698762348e0601e93a457db0/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: BC9209-002 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Lulu Now Lets Men and Women Communicate: Here Are The Strange Things Dudes Are Asking twitter:description: The once women-only app is doing some serious male outreach twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltae32c844f5b5514b/698762348e0601e93a457db0/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Here Are The Strange Things Dudes Are Asking on Lulu's New Messaging Service by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Oct 22, 2014 12:04 PM UTC  Male, female and love-heart symbols on computer keys (Composite) Male, female and love-heart symbols on computer keys (Composite)Getty Images by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Oct 22, 2014 12:04 PM UTC [Lulu](https://onlulu.com/) — an app that allows women to [rate](http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/06/17/rate-the-date-online-lulu-app-lets-women-review-hookups/) men as if they were consumer goods, including [hashtags](http://time.com/2949808/this-map-shows-what-guys-are-like-in-each-major-city/) ranging from the good (#SelfMadeMan) to the gross (#PornEducated) — has now opened up the lines of communication between female and male users. After three weeks of beta testing, the two-year-old app launched its Truth Bombs feature Wednesday, which allows men to anonymously ask women questions. This feedback just might be what they need to raise their Yelp-like score. “This is the first time we are doing any messaging,” said Lulu co-founder Alison Schwartz. “How it works is guys can ask an anonymous question or test out a theory they want to test out with women, some sort of query, and then they get instant feedback from millions of girls.” The new feature pointedly marks the evolving relationship Lulu has with its million-plus male users. When the app launched in Feb. 2013, it was advertised as a secret, ladies-only space to swap information about former male relations. Bros stole glances at female friends’ phones and [attempted hacks](http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-find-your-lulu-rating-2013-6) to see how they were doing. After a slew of Internet backlash (and anti-Lulu [petitions](http://www.change.org/p/lulu-shut-down-lulu)) deriding the app for inciting [bullying](http://www.brophybroncos.org/roundup/index.php/2013/04/new-app-lulu-exacerbates-cyber-bullying/) and gender-based double standards, Lulu [made the experience more male-friendly in 2014](http://jezebel.com/lulu-quietly-made-their-app-a-lot-more-dude-friendly-1536244775) by having a policy where men had to opt-in and give their full permission to be reviewed. In May, the male-outreach went a step further and [Lulu allowed men to check their scores](http://www.businessinsider.com/lulu-for-guys-2014-5), giving them tips and [affirmations](http://www.buzzfeed.com/katienotopoulos/lulu-just-transformed-from-a-dating-app-into-a-cyberbullying). (“Girls **love** your kissing.”) And now, men can go straight to the source and ask women questions. But what have the men been asking? During the beta test, these were the most popular questions verbatim (there are some pretty bad typos), some of which led to 2,500 responses, although most questions average 15 replies: 1. How many guys have you slept with and how old are you… GO ! 2. What age did you loose your virginity? 3. Do women like abs or arms more? 4. How frequently do girls masterbate? 5. Do girls find it attractive if a guy claims p\*\*\*y is being thrown at him left and right? Um, woah. Some of these misspelled questions about “loosing” virginity (“Freudian slip?” asked Scwhartz) are just the type of sophomoric musings you’d expect from a dude who gets to anonymously crowdsource information from anonymous women. But when asked how the women were responding to the questions, Schwartz said, “They are meaningfully answering what the guys are asking about. They are trying to be really helpful.” And there are moderation protocols — “we have designed a product against bullying,” said Scwhartz — to keep things clean, relatively. Although of the 60,000 Truth Bombs that were asked during the three week beta test, averaging some 100 Truth Bombs an hour, only 800 were flagged. For now, the messaging option is all anonymous and each thread is limited to one guy (the one who posed the question) and millions of female users. Although other men can view the threads, they can’t participate in the conversation. “But we see on the app that there’s interested in moving to a one girl one guy dynamic,” said Schwartz. Could the next step in Lulu be one-on-one communication, perhaps enabling dating? “Anything is possible, but we would do that in a way that this is very true to Lulu.” **See Also:** [This Map Shows What Guys Are Like in Each Major City](http://time.com/2949808/this-map-shows-what-guys-are-like-in-each-major-city/) [Rate The Date Online: Lulu App Lets Women Review Hookups](http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/06/17/rate-the-date-online-lulu-app-lets-women-review-hookups/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/"},"headline":"Here Are The Strange Things Dudes Are Asking on Lulu's New Messaging Service","datePublished":"2014-10-22T12:04:27.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:13:57.209Z","description":"The once women-only app is doing some serious male outreach","url":"https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Living","Dating","Technology","apps"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltae32c844f5b5514b/698762348e0601e93a457db0/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Laura Stampler","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltae32c844f5b5514b/698762348e0601e93a457db0/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"BC9209-002","caption":"BC9209-002","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3529975/lulu-messaging-app/","name":"Here Are The Strange Things Dudes Are Asking on Lulu's New Messaging Service"}}]}] ```