Be Real… or be fake?
Almost exactly a year ago… I did a minute about a new app taking high schools and colleges by storm. It’s called BE REAL …
Unlike Instagram where people post pictures of their make believe glamorous and glorious lives… BE REAL was the antidote. The app would command you “take two pictures right now.” One with the lens on the back of your phone … and one with the front. And you would post them. You’d see people without beguiling makeup. Without bulging muscles and perfectly coiffed kids. Gen Z couldn’t get enough of reality and authenticity.
And then… because they have the attention span of a flea… they all got tired of it.
A year later… the New York Times reports BeReal is crashing. It was at the top of the app store as recently as July … but no more. Seems GenZ has seen enough messy bedrooms, lousy food, and plain jane selfies,
In the times Callie Holtermann reports that at first high schoolers loved seeing their friends with all the artifice and glitter shaved away. But after a while… endless pictures of wet hair, overcooked pasta, and laundry piles became boring… compared to the beautiful, vainglorious lives of Kardashians on superyachts, and perfectly lit buff bodies… on Instagram.
So it seems Gen Z is ready to flirt with reality. But when it’s time to settle down… they want fake.
To which every one of them is now saying … OK Boomer.