Outside your FF (FF-gai)
Overview
FF-gai (outside your FF) refers to people you have no follow or follower connection with on social media. FF is short for Follow/Follower. "Excuse me for jumping in from outside your FF" (FF-gai kara shitsurei shimasu) is a set greeting used on X (formerly Twitter) when replying to a tweet from someone you don't know, and it's an expression that spread through Japanese social media culture.
This greeting is said to have come about when the Japanese sense that it's rude to suddenly speak to a stranger was carried over to the online world.
Question boxes and FF-gai
An interesting feature of question boxes is that they cancel out the idea of being outside someone's FF. A question box is anonymous, and anyone can send a question regardless of whether they follow each other. There's no need to open with "Excuse me for jumping in from outside your FF." This low barrier is one of the strengths of question boxes.
Even people who hesitate to reply because "it might be rude to talk to them from outside their FF" can easily send a question through a question box. Anonymity lowers the wall of being outside someone's FF. A question box sometimes creates the first point of contact, which then grows into following each other.
Getting past the FF-gai wall
Some people feel a psychological hurdle about talking to people outside their FF. "I might be bothering them if I talk to a stranger." "They might think I'm weird." This anxiety can take away chances for new connections.
A question box can also be a practice ground for getting past this wall. As you build up experience sending anonymous questions, your reluctance to "communicate with people you don't know" tends to fade. Once you're used to the question box, try sending a reply to someone outside your FF next. Build up small steps and widen how far you go on social media.