BeReal: Promoting Authenticity in the Social Media World

In this fast-paced technological world, social media and digital technology have started to be a great part of everyone's daily life, almost seeming like a necessity for survival. Despite the entertainment we receive from following our favorite celebrity posts and seeing our friends out and about, these highlight reels portray an altered sense of reality in which we often get absorbed in. BeReal, however, takes another path; while most social media apps often involve its users posting the pretty parts of their life, Bereal aims to promote realness and authenticity amidst this digital generation.

What is BeReal?

BeRreal is a photo-sharing social media app that gives you a notification once a day to take a quick shot of what you're doing. It was created in 2020 by former GoPro employee Alexis Barreyat, but only gained most of its popularity in 2022. It now ranks as the 4th most downloaded app, with 70% of its downloads coming from this year.

How does it work?

BeReal is simple; it has no followers or followings and is programmed as one single feed with only a few options. As you go about your day, BeReal will send out a push notification at a random time, giving you 2 minutes to take a quick snapshot of what you're doing and a front-facing selfie. The notification is sent out to everyone at the same time so as you finish your BeReal of the day, you get to see your friends' posts as well. It also allows you to react with a picture or reply with a comment as well; it's as simple as that. There are no extra filters/editing tools or follower/following count. It's mostly used among friend groups or classmates, and sometimes even parents as well.

Why do we care?

Recently social media has been receiving negative connotations attached to it. With the use of social media, people often are obsessed with their popularity, looking good in every photo, making their feed "aesthetic", heavy editing, and only posting the "fun" part of their life. Honestly, there's nothing wrong with wanting to show and document a fun glimpse of your life or sharing a photo that you think you look good in; also, who wants to document the bad parts of their life? The only problem is that we get so consumed by it we often forget that no one lives like that 24/7. No one is always out having fun, and no one is always happy and excited about life. Social media encourages a toxic "smile for the picture" culture that can be harmful and detrimental to teenagers' mental health. "What am I doing with my life?" "Why don't I always look this good?" "My life is so boring," are some of the many questions that people often ask themselves after seeing others' social media posts. As a response, people start to heavily edit their photos, and some even go as far as faking a lifestyle to look good— almost creating some sort of competition to look the best or have the most followers. As much as they want it to fill in the part of their life they feel is missing, it's not good enough to fill in that hole.

This is where Bereal comes in; not only does it go against social media's toxic culture of trying to be popular, it allows people to send in an unfiltered, pure picture of themselves going about their day. There are no highly edited highlights of their life or picking and choosing pictures to post. It reminds people of the important and authentic small things in life that we often forget. It connects you with the people closest to you and promotes the idea that social media isn't as big of a deal as we think it is. Recently, Bereal has established its popularity amongst the students at Logos. BeReal has allowed people to bond with each other and has been quite the entertainment at LogosAmidf this advanced world, I think this app is a great step towards authenticity, giving us a more positive use of social media.

- Halena C.