Smartphone addicts may be using their devices while sitting on the toilet, but does that mean they want to chat to one another?

Three quarters of smartphone owners admit to using their devices while sitting on the toilet, so perhaps the only surprise is that it’s taken this long for an app to link them up to other random people also perching on the loo.

Released by developer Ricardo Gruber, the free iPhone app Pooductive offers anonymous messaging, with the hook that everyone you encounter will be similarly occupied.

“Think of it as a magical place where people from around the globe can anonymously meet to enjoy their time of zen, peace and quite together, by conversing, philosophising and sharing ideas with each other. You can add friends, have group chats or simply enjoy a 1 on 1 conversation... it is so much better and more entertaining then simply reading the back of a shampoo bottle.”

Complete with a promotional screenshot with someone frankly sharing more information than we feel is necessary on a family website, the app is unlikely to rival messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, which have 800 million and 700 million active users respectively.

Love in the time of technology: an app for every moment | Eva Wiseman Read more

Gruber will be hoping that Pooductive is more popular with iPhone owners than it was with visitors to crowdfunding site Kickstarter earlier this year. A campaign trying to raise €10k to make the app attracted just three backers and €184 of pledges before it was cancelled.

“Most of our personal money has been invested into making this app a reality. However, since we are only students, we no longer have the financial resources needed to sustain the financial lifeline needed to allow Pooductive to reach its full potential,” explained the pitch.

The main obstacle to the app’s success is that all those toilet-toiling smartphone users are using their regular social apps: Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and – shudder at the implications here if you like – Snapchat.

Update: Pooductive developers Gruber and Marco Hernandez contacted the Guardian to explain that there’s more to their app than just chat.

“We hope to connect Pooductive with some big charities that focus on both clean water and improving hygiene in developing countries,” they wrote in an email, adding that press interest came quickly and unexpectedly, so the charitable aspect has not yet launched.

“We’re working as fast as we can to realise our mission and get the charities we have already connected to on board. We hope that through this, Pooductive can have a positive impact - past connecting people on the loo - which has always been our intention.”