Is the writing on the wall for social media’s old guard?

Hundreds of Facebook employees, still working from home due to the coronavirus pandemic, staged a “virtual walkout” this week over the company’s response (or lack thereof) to inflammatory statements made by Donald Trump. Specifically, the US President has used racially charged language to vent his displeasure over the protests against the killing of George Floyd. While Facebook has yet to censor Trump’s social media outbursts, rival platform Twitter took the remarkable step of attaching a warning to one of Trump’s posts which flagged it as glorifying violence.

Facebook’s failure to follow suit has seen them face criticism across the board, including from within their own ranks, while prominent angel investor Jason Calacanis urged users to ditch both Instagram and its parent company in favor of alternatives he has pledged to fund. But even before the latest scandal, it seems that users have already begun flocking to a new generation of social media platforms which operate upon a different set of principles, suggesting that the tide is turning for those which value profit and popularity above privacy and mental health.

Facebook out of touch

Historically, the behemoths of social media have towed the line when it comes to placating those in positions of power. However, Twitter broke ranks last week by fact-checking Trump’s prolific online output, earning a sharp rebuke from the White House and an executive order aimed at limiting the platform’s censorial capabilities. Unperturbed, Twitter went on to vet Trump’s latest outburst over the Minneapolis riots, an approach that is in sharp contrast to Facebook’s stance on the matter.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg criticized his counterpart for Twitter’s pretension as “arbiters of truth” and instead pledged $10 million towards fighting for racial justice in the country. However, that donation, which comprises a tiny fraction of Facebook’s overall market capitalization, was dubbed “one of the most insulting things I’ve ever seen” by one civil rights group leader, while more than a thousand of Zuckerberg’s own employees voted against the decision to let Trump’s words go unchallenged.

The move also drew stinging rebukes from several high-up Facebook employees, including Portal’s design chief Andrew Crow and director of product management Jason Toff. Meanwhile, influential angel investor Calacanis, who has been involved in global tech success stories like Uber, Tumblr and Calm, announced he would be diverting capital to launch platforms which could replace the social media giants under Facebook’s umbrella… but fortunately, plenty of ethically driven alternatives already exist.

The socially responsible face of social media

Leading the way is French start-up Yubo, which has tried to steer clear of the race for likes that has characterized platforms like Facebook and Instagram, seeking instead to spark long-distance friendships centred around common interests. Given that Yubo is aimed at 13- to 25-year-olds, the app has taken a proactive approach to self-regulation and placed a particular emphasis on privacy and safety, drafting in an expert on the subject to help craft innovative policies.

Steps taken so far include harnessing the power of machine learning to ensure that users are the age they say they are and are appropriately dressed in Yubo’s livestreams, as well as a partnership with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to safeguard the app’s online community.

The benefits of placing its users ahead of its own profit margins have proved as popular among the former as they have lucrative for the latter, especially during the current COVID-19 crisis. Before the pandemic upended our lives and sent many people looking for companionship online, the app was already reporting healthy new sign-up figures of 10,000 to 15,000 per day; by mid-April, that figure had more than doubled to 30,000. The app now has almost 30 million users worldwide and generates around €10 million in revenue, earning its founders a place on this year’s prestigious Forbes Under 30 list.

Elsewhere, photo-sharing and editing site VSCO is enjoying similar esteem among an online audience more concerned with inspiration than influencers. Its appeal is not entirely dissimilar to that of Instagram, but without the “popularity contest” components of like, comment and follower counts. Neither does it generate profit by selling ad space or peddling its customers’ sensitive data to the highest bidder, but instead operates a robust freemium business model anchored by a strong customer base of paying subscribers.

Those measures are paying off handsomely. VSCO is on track to exceed four million users this year, while its annual revenues are nearing $80 million. What’s more, its adherents are a young audience, likely to provide value for many years to come; around 75% of all users and 55% of paying users are less than 25 years old. With a CEO who still prioritizes family above the corporate daily grind, it’s not hard to view VSCO as filling the vacuum left by Instagram once it was swallowed up by Facebook in 2012.

A more humane social network

The ongoing coronavirus crisis has demonstrated that while we may need to isolate from others, we will still crave human contact as much as (if not more than) before. Indeed, social media networks which don’t sacrifice their core values for corporate greed are needed now more than ever. As so often happens, necessity has proven to be the mother of invention during these unprecedented times, with a raft of tech companies forging forward to provide valuable services such as streamlined streaming broadcasts and remote recruitment tools to a public crying out for the moral compass of compassion in its time of need.

Unless Facebook and other social media titans listen to the winds of change and alter their course accordingly, they’re in danger of becoming overtaken by rivals more committed to meeting the evolving needs of a socially conscious consumer base. But regardless of whether those behemoths ultimately sink or swim, it seems inevitable that we’re witnessing a pronounced sea change in the world of social media, with an exciting array of new platforms riding the crest of that wave towards a more integrated and empathetic tomorrow.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes