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Barometer The Daily
TUESDAY, MAY 7, 2013 • OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY CORVALLIS, OREGON 97331
DAILYBAROMETER.COM
Who is the Face of OSU Athletics?
VOLUME CXVI, NUMBER 130
Lulu strikes OSU n
A popular female-only mobile app that allows women to rate men gains popularity among OSU students By Warner Strausbaugh The Daily Barometer
Photo illustration by jackie seus
design by evan parcher
| THE DAILY BAROMETER
| THE DAILY BAROMETER
A male Oregon State University student walks into a bar. He strikes up a conversation with a female student. The two talk for five minutes. The usual questions about hometowns and majors are answered. They exchange names. The woman checks her smartphone. She opens up Lulu — a mobile application that lets women rate men on a variety of categories, which gives them a rating from 4.0 to 10. Only women can use it. She has his rating now. And it’s not pretty. Check, please. ‘Start-up fever’ Alexandra Chong had an epiphany at a brunch with a group of close friends. It was the morning after Valentine’s Day in 2009. They were discussing their dates from the night before. “The guy wasn’t for me but, while talking to these girls, I realized we all needed a place to sing the praises of guys who might be perfect for other girls,” Chong said in an interview via email. Lulu was born. Chong’s first job after graduating with a law degree from the London School of Economics was with a music listening start-up company. “That’s where I got ‘start-up fever,’” Chong said. “I loved the energy of start-up culture and the sense of possibility. I was always on the lookout for an idea of my own.” While working as the global head of marketing and public relations for Upstream, a mobile marketing company, Chong began formulating that idea. Sparked from the post-Valentine’s Day brunch, she began working on a female-only app to privately recommend and review men. The idea consumed her, and she quit her job to work full-time on achieving her goal. Luluvise Ltd. — the company’s original name — was officially registered on Jan. 19, 2010 with Chong as its founder and CEO. She raised $1 million and hired 12 staff members, and Luluvise.com launched in December 2011. The website connected through Facebook,
only allowing access to those who listed their gender as female. Users created their “inner circle” on Luluvise, which kept conversations private. The most popular feature of Luluvise.com was Wikidate, a pre-set quiz in which users could review men who have Facebook accounts. The ratings were made public, and men could not see or edit them because they were not allowed on the site. Luluvise did not gain much notoriety, but it set the foundation for something that would soon be the topic of many conversations. ‘The first ever app for private reviews of guys’ Chong found her niche: colleges. Lulu, the company’s new mobile application, had an invitation-only launch at the University of Florida and Florida State University in January 2013. In the month-long private beta, Lulu reported more than 60,000 female students downloaded the app, and 140,000 reviews of men had been created. The app went public on Feb. 7, becoming available to download on iPhones and Android devices in the United States. After downloading the app, users can anonymously join Lulu by connecting through their Facebook accounts. The home screen shows an assortment of male Facebook profiles — either Facebook friends with the user or someone with whom the user shares mutual friends. Reviewers are first prompted to disclose their relationship with the subject. The choices are: ex-boyfriend, crush, together, hooked up, friend or relative. From there, users give a rating between one and five stars for as many as seven categories: appearance, humor, first kiss, manners, ambition, sex and commitment. Then there are dozens of hashtags, ranging from hilarious to vulgar, to attach to the subject. There are positive hashtags to dole out, such as: #RespectsWomen, #SweetToMom, #SexualPanther, #SmellsAmazeballs, #NerdyButILikeit. And there are negative ones: #QuestionableSearchHistory, #IntegrityChallenged, #CheaperThanABigMac, #TrustFundBaby, #LoserFriends. “The goal has always been to create a private, trusted, girls-only space dedicated to collective wisdom,” Chong said. “We want to tap into and release the value of girl talk.” See LULU | page 2
‘Agvocating’ for change Conference takes on promise, peril of American power n
Annual Ag Day to be held in Memorial Union quad with newly introduced Ag Olympics By Lara von Linsowe-Wilson The Daily Barometer
The Oregon State University College of Agricultural Sciences will be hosting their annual Ag Day Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Memorial Union quad. The theme of this year’s Ag Day is “Preserving Tradition. Agvocating Today. Growing Tomorrow.” During the event, various student clubs within the College of Agricultural Sciences will join with agriculture business vendors to “agvocate” for a more sustainable future in agricultural practices. A new supplement to Ag Day this year will be the Ag Olympics, which will feature activities such as milk chugging, tractor driving, dummy roping and sack races for students and faculty. In addition, a barbecue lunch will be provided by the Young Cattlemen’s Association. This year, Ag Day activities will stretch over two days. A canned food drive dubbed “Ag in the Community” will take place tomorrow as a community service project benefitting the OSU Emergency Food Pantry. With more than 30 student and academic groups participating last year, Ag Day has come to be an anticipated event across campus. For more information on this and other events hosted by the College of Agricultural Sciences, visit their website at http://www.agsci.oregonstate.edu. Lara von Linsowe-Wilson, news reporter news@dailybarometer.com
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Military and Diplomatic History Conference to take place at the LaSells Stewart Center, Memorial Union By Spencer Ingram The Daily Barometer
The American Military and Diplomatic History Conference, hosted today in the LaSells Stewart Center, will “challenge the public’s way they think about American power historically [and what that means for] the United States,” said professor and keynote panelist Christopher McKnight Nichols. There will be supplementary day sessions held in the Memorial Union Journey Room from 2-5 p.m. Supplementary sessions will cover particular subjects such as international revolutions and political discourse in antebellum America, the art and science of American diplomacy and the forgotten history of American foreign policy success. The conference and day sessions offer a critical analysis of American history over time and how its history has defined its power. Nichols, the keynote panelist, professor and session moderator, has organized the conference to present “the newest scholarly take on the history of American military and diplomacy.”
“People are coming from England, Essentially, the book and the conference Australia and [other countries]” to the attempt to get at the question of the “uses conference, Nichols said. Also, CSPAN will of history,” Nichols said. be taping the event and the Oregonian will As a moderator of the supplementary be there. sessions, Nichols said the difficulties of Nichols further continued that the confer- presenting in a conference format include ence is a “great time to have a dynamic dis- “catering to different audience levels of cussion, showcase the great work at Oregon historical knowledge.” State University” and also an opportunity to “Helping [the] speaker and launch his new book. audience in framing questions” is “I have chosen to focus on the essential to “facilitating efficient theme of weakness of American debate,” Nichols said. power because it upsets the apple“It’s a unique opportunity [for cart,” Nichols said. people to see scholars] at the The ultimate aim of the confertop of their game that have put ence is to “challenge conceptions together the most comprehenof power, how we define it and the sive encyclopedia” on American ways American power has been Military and Diplomacy, Nichols negotiated,” Nichols said. said. Nichols — along with professors David Milne and Timothy Lynch All conference attendees Christopher McKnight — recently co-authored “The will have an opportunity to Nichols Oxford Encyclopedia of American obtain discount vouchers for Military and Diplomatic History.” the volumes of “The Oxford The book will be used to provide discus- Encyclopedia of American Military and sion and framing for the conference. Diplomatic History.” “[The] book covers the sweep of American Nichols emphasized there is “no betcolonial history through 2012,” Nichols said. ter topic than the promise and peril of More than 450 authors are in the ency- American power to understand the U.S.’s clopedia, including contemporary scholars role in the world’s past and contemporary such as George Herring and Jeremi Suri. times.” The encyclopedia is written for laymen Spencer Ingram, news reporter and offers biographical, thematic and historical analyses of American history. news@dailybarometer.com