Olivia DeRamus is flipping the script: “What if scrolling through social media didn’t make us miserable? What if, especially for women, social media could actually make us feel more supported?”.
“It’s certainly not what mainstream social platforms have been built for,” DeRamus told TechCrunch. But with her social platform Communia, DeRamus is daring to try something that seems counterintuitive.
Communia is both a social platform and a mental health tool; you can post updates in a community feed, or you can privately journal and track your emotions over time. But for users to get vulnerable, they need to feel safe. So, the platform is taking an approach that could polarize some, but could reassure others: People must verify their identity before they can fully use the app.
“It’s a safety feature, but it also kind of sets the tone that this is an intimate space and that you’re safe here,” she said. “So people feel more empowered to talk about their PMDD, or to talk about the difficult life experience they’re going through.”
I’ve always suspected that anonymous pseudonyms have often led to online abuses, bullying and trolling. So by identifying people, we would probably see more accountability and respect online. I get that many don’t want to be identified online, and that is a perfectly good choice, but for those who want a safer place online the choice to choose a network that verifies identity may be their perfect choice. And I believe it is very good that there is this choice to be had.
But to survive, it will need to be economically viable. With verified identities, you really do not want to have your metadata being shared elsewhere. So let’s hope the economic model is sustainable and also respects rights to privacy.
See https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/18/communia-bets-social-media-can-be-good-for-you/