There is a new social media app that is out and threatening to take over. Vero boasts that it is Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter all in one. I heard about this app through a couple creator pages that I follow on Instagram, their reasoning for making the switch was that Instagram algorithms are making it impossible for these types of accounts to maintain their reach or gain new followers. My interest was piqued when I read this reasoning and I decided to investigate it. Unfortunately, it seems many other people did too, because soon after downloading the app, creating an account, and requesting to follow a couple of these creators, the app crashed.
Before it crashed, I poked around the new app; I found it interesting that you can easily manage your list of who you are following and designate posts for specific groups: close friends, friends, acquaintances, or followers. I like the idea that I can personalize who is seeing what in a simple way. Because, while true you can change privacy settings on Facebook and manage who is seeing what, this always felt too cumbersome to me, and, honestly, by the time it became a bit easier to manage I had already virtually removed myself from Facebook, maintaining a profile for business advertising reasons and to, very rarely, scroll through the feed.
Social media is a great way to find your tribe, to gather inspiration, learn about events, and attend virtual events. But the apps that are widely used now are not without their flaws. Instagram became my most used as a quick and easy way to share personal pictures with family, recommend books, or catch up on what is happening in their lives. However, the recent change in the feed means that I am now seeing posts from last week rather than current ones, and I am missing out on a lot of posts because of the new algorithm that has been introduced. Twitter was useful in connecting with the publishing world but in the last few months, it has become volatile—twitter in general, not the publishing world. It has become a nightmare to try to post anything, even an article or a book, because someone won’t agree with it and you will become bombarded with reasons why you are wrong.
In these ways, social media can be draining. I have been looking for a way to still be able to make that connection, to have a sense of community within a group that is far reaching while being able to stay on top of publishing trends and which publishers are looking for what type of materials. I am not sure if Vero is going to be the answer, but so far it has made it easy to share books I have read while managing who can see what. It looks promising, but only time will tell and I imagine, it, like all the others, in time will succumb to the same algorithm issues. Now, if only it would reboot and I could explore a little further.
