[cowb0yl0gic]

As an introvert, I completely understand where this is coming from. What you are trying to create is a way for people to signal intent in an emotionally safe way. But I think this misses the mark (by substituting technical infrastructure for quintessentially human interaction; by encouraging "someone is" vs. "I am"). There is an art to "working toward" a discussion or disclosure (which many people are not good at, and many situations make difficult). To help someone find a way to say something (difficult or risky) to someone (who may not be receptive), and to allow the other party to reverse-signal gently (possibly by "affirmatively" ignoring) would be valuable, but as complex as the varied use cases. I think a system that helped people work through what they want to accomplish and possibilities for achieving that would be useful; the infrastructure for communication is already there, we just need to think about how to use it better (think guided workflow, decision tree or expert system). Having a mechanism to "buffer" between the sender and receiver might be helpful (ex., sending someone flowers or a card/letter vs. speaking to them) to overcome emotional resistance, but shouldn't substitute for thinking through <your state> + <situational state> + <other's state> => <appropriate action>.

[dougk16]

Very thoughtful comment, thank you. I am going to write up a blog post on why you should not use Thoughter in the first place, or at least only as a "break the ice" mechanism, and I'm going to use a lot of the comments here like yours as fodder.