How it feels to BeReal
Recently I've been using BeReal, a new social media app (link). The website copy says it all:
Everyday at a different time, everyone is notified simultaneously to capture and share a Photo in 2 Minutes.
Every day I get a push notification. I open BeReal and press the one button offered, which takes two photos: one with the front-facing camera, and one with the back. Then, having paid my dues, I get to see what my friends are up to. I can comment on their photos or leave tiny "RealMoji" snaps of my own face in reaction.
That's the main experience, and I like it. But it's hard for me to explain why, except through comparison.
BeReal reminds me of the early days of using Snapchat. I was in high school then, and Snapchat was the preferred way, in my social circles, to casually share everyday moments. A funny joke on a cafe's chalkboard sign, sent to friends who would appreciate that kind of humor. A cute dog on the street, for friends who like dogs. Something ridiculous they're selling at Costco now. Stuff like that.
In a world where Snapchat did not exist, would I go out of my way to take these photos and send them to those same sets of people? Absolutely not. But it was so easy, and the 10-second timer made it deliberately transient, like a quick in-person chat. It's shallow - yeah, that's the point. I did have good conversations too, peppered with eyeballs-and-above-only selfies, with no permanent record to look back on now.
Besides the person-to-person Snapchat experience, there's also Stories: a feature to post a photo for all of your friends for 24 hours. These tend to be flashier: check out this cool concert I'm at, or this date I'm on, or the friends I'm with, or the food I made/am eating. Stories had a bit of a social element to them too: you could see who had chosen to view your story; in other words, who was interested enough to pull your updates rather than having you push them out. [footnote 1]
BeReal feels like a Snapchat story, except you can only post one per day, and you're only supposed to do it at a certain time. It ends up refreshingly mundane, even more so than sending casual snaps to friends. Here's my last seven BeReals:
- Kitchen, eating strawberries
- Kitchen again, putting away some groceries
- Desk, writing a Google doc for work
- Desk again, reading an email for work
- In bed, having just woken up
- Desk, reading a Slack thread for work
- Kitchen again, eating lunch
It's a slice of life, and not even in the cutesy anime way. Most of my friends on the app are working full-time and the photos definitely reflect it: my feed abounds with laptops and desks [footnote 2]. I'll leave a few photo reactions, imitating their expressions or just raising a questioning eyebrow, and maybe a comment or two. They're alive; I'm alive; and we retain the barest thread of a connection, not having seen each other in person for years.
Almost by definition, if I'm engaged in something interesting, then I'll miss the prompt and take a "late" photo of whatever boring thing I'm doing afterwards when I realize. And yet, I still feel that nagging social media urge to put out the best possible image of myself. [footnote 3]
Isn't that ridiculous? On an app called "BeReal", about being real, I hesitate to take a photo lying in bed post-nap. I contemplate moving to the kitchen, leftovers still out from lunch; or the tiny workout room, to remind people that I own a pair of dumbbells; or the nearby park for the SF skyline views. But a sense of empowerment stops me: I do not need to impress anyone, at least not here. If nothing else, this app is a good place to practice that. The photo of my bedroom ceiling goes up, and I go back down for round two of napping.
Footnotes
[footnote 1] (back to content)
Actually, there were a lot of other features that played into that social aspect, notably: read receipts, the "streaks" of consecutive days snapped together, the "best friend" list of the most frequently messaged friends. Snapchat had a bunch of other notable features - the first popular face filters, location-based filters, Bitmoji, Snap Map - as well as its own share of scandal over the years. Despite the app's reputation, my usage actually did revolve around the casual sharing and chat mentioned above. I still use it in much the same way today, though less frequently as people leave the app.
[footnote 2] (back to content)
The photos from people who are still students are much more vibrant, varied, and interesting - scenes of campus, activities, friends, and not the same desk day after day. This is surely a sign that I'm not actually the target audience, but anyways...
[footnote 3] (back to content)
The reflex to flex, you might say. I noticed while writing this that although "flex" in the sense of "show off" originates from flexing your muscles, there's also "flex" meaning "bend" - as in, bending an object out of its normal state, or even bending the truth. Not that I think it's intentionally meaningful, but an interesting connection there.
The space below is left empty so that clicking on footnotes will scroll to the correct location.