For the longest time, creating a new social media app was impossible.
All of the big players we see today started many years ago.
Facebook was started 21 years ago. Linkedin 23. Instagram & Pinterest 15.1
By now, they have it all locked down. User needs were largely met, and there was no demand for something new. The incumbents had huge network effects that let no one to switch and try anything else.
But post-COVID, people’s behaviors started shifting and their needs are evolving.
The social media apps we use have become all about consumption. They are designed to keep you scrolling endlessly to maximise your time spent on the platform. The obsession with metrics like likes, comments, and shares means creating feels like a chore. It’s intimidating, and it takes effort to make something “worthy” of posting.
As a result, the average person barely posts anymore2—they just consume. And this endless consumption often leads to mindless doom-scrolling, leaving people frustrated and mentally drained.
Also, these platforms were meant to keep you connected with your closed ones. But it’s getting harder to actually see their posts because of the number of businesses and influencers’ and ads we see in our feed instead.
And so, digital fatigue is at an all-time high. People are starting to feel the effects of endless scrolling: the wasted time, the mental exhaustion, the lack of real fulfillment.
There’s a growing awareness that something needs to change.
It’s no wonder we are starting to see a rise in apps like One Sec and Opal, and chrome extensions like BlockSite and Unhook, which are all designed to limit your screen time.
But I believe they are just Band-Aid solutions. Most people are gradually quitting those apps because they don’t solve the root problem.
We keep going back to social media, even when we know it’s bad for us because it fulfills deep psychological needs:
- We crave staying in touch with your closed ones. The sense of belonging/community. 3
- We want to know what others are up to. Feeds our inner curiosity.
- We need spaces to share who we are. Also serves as validation on how others will see us.
- We want something to do when we are bored.4 A default to browse anytime.
These needs haven’t gone away, and they won’t. Telling people to “just don’t use social media” is not realistic. Instead, we need platforms that meet these needs in healthier, more fulfilling ways.
That is the opportunity.
After almost 2 decades, the people are craving for another social app. A healthier alternative.
The window to create the next social app has opened.
I can’t wait.5
- Ok yes, there’s TikTok but we have to admit that it’s an outlier that’s really hard to replicate. Also, even that was created almost 10 years ago. ↩︎
- https://posting-nexus.ghost.io/people-arent-posting/ ↩︎
- This concept of Third Space ↩︎
- Related: What does boredom actually mean ↩︎
- I want to give credit to this very cool article from nfx that inspired me to write this ↩︎