Switch between personas

Once you've created personas, you can switch between them to control how you appear across the app.

Quick-switching personas

The fastest way to switch personas is from the avatar dropdown in the top-right:

1. Click your profile avatar in the header.
2. Look for "Posting as [name]": hover or click to see your persona list.
3. Select the persona you want to use.
4. A checkmark appears next to the active persona.

When you're using a non-default persona, your avatar will show a colored ring so you always know you're posting under an alternate identity.

Switching in the receipt form

You can also switch personas directly in the receipt form:

1. When creating a receipt, find the persona selector below the editor.
2. Click to see your available personas.
3. Select the persona you want to post as.
4. Submit your receipt, it will be attributed to that persona.

Switching in comments

The comment section also lets you switch personas:

1. Click your avatar next to the comment input box.
2. Select the persona you want to comment as.
3. Type and submit your comment.

Your profile

Every persona with a handle has a public profile at /p/your-handle, and /p/me opens the one you're posting as right now. Near the top sits your showcase, the receipts you've pinned, and below it your public receipts, newest first. A watch party anyone can join that this persona is hosting is listed there too, under Watch parties, for ninety days after it happens.

A pinned receipt stays on your profile only while it is public and approved. If it becomes unavailable while the profile is open, visitors stop seeing it and you get an explanation in its place.

Your public receipts load twenty at a time. Load more keeps going when a page contains only receipts that are no longer available. No more receipts means the list has ended; Try again means the next read failed. Receipts already loaded also disappear if they become unavailable.

Editing your profile

On your own profile page, Edit profile opens the editor. Your display name, bio, accent, banner and avatar are all in there, along with the showcase: pick up to twelve of your public receipts and put them in the order you want them read. The editor below is the real one running on sample receipts, so nothing you do in it is saved.

Badges and progress per persona

Each persona earns its own badges, and a badge shows only on the profile of the persona that earned it. The count after each one is how many public profiles show that badge.

Status milestones work the same way: the qualifying weeks and the badge belong to the persona that earned them.

Your progress page follows the persona you're using: switch personas and it shows that persona's badges and milestones instead. Drafts stay the same either way, because a draft belongs to the device rather than to a persona. Your progress and badges covers what counts and what stays private.

Friend streaks and your personas

A friend streak pairs two personas, not two accounts. The persona you're using when you invite a friend, or accept an invitation, is the one in the streak, and the friends you can pick are that persona's: people it follows who follow it back. Switching personas shows that persona's streaks instead.

Your friend sees your persona's name and handle, and each week only whether you met the goal. Nothing in a streak says which account is behind a persona, and two personas of the same account can't pair with each other.

If you stop following each other, or one of you blocks the other, the streak pauses on its own. Your progress and badges covers the goal, the weeks and how to leave.

Opening someone's profile

An author's name is a button wherever you see it: on a receipt, on a comment, and on a watch party's roster. Select it and their profile opens beside the page, or up from the bottom on a phone, with their bio, how many people follow them, any badges they have earned, and their three most recent public receipts. Follow sits at the top, next to their name. Open full profile at the bottom goes to their page at /p/their-handle, where the rest of their receipts are.

Only one profile is open at a time. Select another name while one is up and the same panel switches to that person instead of stacking a second one. Escape closes it, and so do the close button and a click outside it.

The demo below is the real panel running on sample people, so nothing you do in it is saved.

Seeing who follows someone

The counts on a profile are buttons. Select one and the people behind that number appear: on someone's page the list opens under their header, and in the profile panel it takes the place of their profile until you go back. Followers, Following and Friends are three tabs on the same list, so you can move between them without closing anything.

People arrive twenty at a time. Load more brings the next twenty and tells you when there are none left. Selecting anyone in the list opens their profile, the same panel you get anywhere else. Close on a page, or Back to profile in the panel, puts you back where you started.

You only see people you're allowed to see, so a list can be shorter than the count beside it, and some profiles show no list at all.

The list below is the real one running on sample people, so nothing you do in it is saved.

When to use different personas

• Casual commentary: use a fun, informal persona for entertainment-focused takes.
• Research and education: use an academic persona when posting fact-checks or citations to pin notes to specific moments.
• Professional: use a professional persona when annotating work-related content.
• Lower-stakes participation: use a persona when you want to contribute without being immediately recognized.

Notes

• Your active persona applies almost everywhere: switching it changes who you post as on the public feed and on any feed you haven't bound to a specific persona, until you switch back.
• Custom feeds can lock a persona: when you accept an invite to a custom feed, you pick the persona you join as, and the composer stays fixed to it in that feed. There's no switcher there, so you post consistently.
• Works across devices: your active persona syncs to all your logged-in devices.
• Existing content is unaffected: switching personas doesn't change previously posted receipts or comments.
• Feed permissions are account-based: your persona doesn't affect what feeds you can access. Permissions apply to your account regardless of which persona you're using.
• Unlinkable, not fully anonymous: no one reading your posts, including a feed owner who invited you, can tie a persona to your account or group your personas together. For safety and abuse handling, our moderators keep a private, internal-only way to resolve the account behind a persona.
• All personas are tied to your Google account: you don't need separate logins.

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