group hug is a website that publishes anonymous confessions. Readers of the site are encouraged to "confess" using a simple form. The site was launched in September 2003 by Gabriel Jeffrey and it remains a "spare-time project" of Jeffrey and Adam Bregenzer.
The site appeals to both voyeuristic and exhibitionist tendencies. A book, Stoned, Naked and Looking in My Neighbor's Window (ISBN 1-932112-36-7 published by Justin, Charles & Company), compiled confessions from the site. There is also a UK-specific edition of the book (ISBN 0-7432-6826-1 published by Simon & Schuster UK).
The site also has a Dutch-speaking version.
group hug created a podcast, called Audiocrush, "a Podcast about confessions, music, and everything else." group hug is predated by the Apology Project and digitally by Not Proud. Not Proud was started three years earlier in 2000.
As of September 2012, grouphug.us is showing a "Thank You" underneath the picture of a coffee pot which links to its Facebook page. The site is perhaps closed forever.
Famous quotes containing the words group and/or hug:
“Belonging to a group can provide the child with a variety of resources that an individual friendship often cannot—a sense of collective participation, experience with organizational roles, and group support in the enterprise of growing up. Groups also pose for the child some of the most acute problems of social life—of inclusion and exclusion, conformity and independence.”
—Zick Rubin (20th century)
“We hug the earth,—how rarely we mount! Methinks we might elevate ourselves a little more. We might climb a tree, at least.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)