VERO vs Instagram: Why Photographers Should Try VERO
Social Media App Vero True Social has recently exploded in popularity, especially amongst photographers.
We’re hearing and seeing more and more that Instagram is dead for photographers. Better said, most photographers are feeling that Instagram is dead. While I could write plenty on the reasons behind that, I imagine that if you’re reading this, you are well aware of those, because you’ve experienced them yourself. If you aren’t familiar though, I did a post a month ago about evaluating our relationship with Instagram which covers some of the factors contributing to what I call a downward spiral of the social media giant. Also in the last month, an alternative social media app, VERO, has exploded in popularity. Though the app was first released back in 2015 and had some buzz around it in 2018, that spark died fairly quickly. I won’t dive into why that might have happened, but I can confidently say that from what I've seen, there’s no reason for the buzz to fade this time!
Earlier this week I posted a reel on Instagram, with me dancing in the clouds to tell fellow photographers why they should try VERO. Today, I want to talk about those reasons, as well as expand the list. I know that attention spans may not handle so many, so I only elaborate on the original 10 from the reel, with a simple bonus list at the end. While my focus is on VERO for photographers, I believe it’s also a great place for other artists and creators, and to be honest, I think it may not be long before everyday social media users find it to be a great alternative too. It seems funny saying this because it’s a social media app, but it’s been a breath of fresh air. If you’re looking for an unbiased analysis, you’ve probably already noticed you’ll want to search elsewhere. Instagram has become more and more frustrating for me, while I’m finding new things to love about VERO everyday. Here’s what I’ve experienced so far:
I was so excited about VERO, I made an Instagram reel to tell photographers why they should try it out. If you haven’t seen my dance in clouds yet, here’s your chance (probably your only one ever).
1) No ads
How many ads do you think you’re bombarded with every time you use Instagram? On VERO, you’ll see zero. Their terms of use says: “Our mission at VERO is to provide a social network where the user is the center of the network, not an advertiser or some entity looking to follow and track you. VERO is a true social network where you can connect with other people and build your community without worrying about us tracking your behavior for advertisers or selling your content.” Now, I don’t think I need to include Instagram’s wording on their terms of service for contrast, as most people are well aware that they are constantly tracking our every move, and providing data on our interests to advertisers so they can constantly fill our feed with ads. In a recent interview, co-founder and CEO of VERO Ayman Hariri said that he’d rather shut down VERO before doing ads or selling out to a bigger company like Facebook. So how will they make money without ads? Hariri explains, “We haven’t turned on subscription yet, but we will when the time is right in order to make VERO self-sustaining, but anyone who has a VERO account before we turn on subscriptions will get a free account for life.” In other words, simply sign up now to avoid having to ever pay any fee in the future. Lastly, I’ll say that it’s always a good idea to read the terms of service before joining social media, or anything really, and VERO’s is quite clear and concise, providing the legal terms side by side with a plain english explanation.
An ad I had in my Instagram feed. Wait…did Instagram just pay money to itself for an ad to tell me I can make money for myself on their platform?
2) No algorithm
On VERO, instead of an algorithm force feeding you what it thinks you want to see, based on some random comment you made weeks ago, or a video you watched because a friend sent it, you get to curate your own feed. Not only is it exclusively posts from those that you follow, but you can filter it by category. For example let’s say, I don’t know, maybe you don’t want to see any videos, then you’ll just see photos. Imagine that. There are plenty of other positive side effects to no algorithm. It also means not having to worry about figuring out a constantly changing system, and not having an abundance of cringe posts from trends designed to “hack the algorithm”. The same songs and audio clips and looping reels to get you to spend more time watching are just two annoyances that come to mind. When you post content on VERO, it’s not monitoring the “performance” of it, and then pushing it out based on various unknown factors. It simply appears in the feeds of those that follow you. Just think of how most social media was several years ago. Now, you might wonder, ‘How do I reach new viewers in an algorithm-free environment?’. There are multiple ways to expand your audience, including multiple features for discovering content from those that you don’t follow. Hashtags are also a thing, and work essentially the same as they used to on Instagram. The beauty of all this is it’s never force fed to anyone, it’s only when a user chooses to explore and find new content.
3) No aspect ratio constraints
There are several basic and fundamental features that Instagram has never had, or never got right, and I still find myself wondering how that can be for a company so big. The app is simply a mess with its handling of aspect ratios and images being cut off, etc. On Vero though, you can post an image with any dimensions, and not have to worry about cropping or anything else. In fact, you can post multiple photos in the same post, all with varying dimensions, and not even have to think about it! They are seamlessly uploaded and displayed, and beautifully I might add! (see #5). On Instagram in that same scenario, you’d have to use a separate app and take your images through an extra process just to get them to show up correctly when uploaded.
A VERO post of mine on the mobile app, where I uploaded 2 different crops of the same image. You can easily swipe between them and view full screen if you want. On Instagram, it’s extra work to be able to do something like this, and images cannot be viewed full screen.
4) No pushing video
Enough said? I guess I’ll just add this: VERO doesn’t care if you post photos or videos. Post what you want, your followers will see it in their feed. Simple huh? Oh yeah, and let’s not forget you can easily filter your feed to be just photos.
5) Superb image quality
This is another basic thing that Instagram never got right. Beautiful images are often destroyed due to compression upon uploading. I see this on many of my photos with a lot of empty sky, which when uploaded have major color banding, appearing as pixelation and blurriness. Image compression is basically unavoidable with social media, but many photographers found it frustrating that the image quality was quite noticeably diminished on Instagram. Not so on VERO. I have not yet noticed any degraded quality or artifacts from compression.
A side-by-side comparison of the exact same file uploaded to Instagram (left), and VERO (right). I slightly zoomed in on both. A frequent issue I run into on Instagram was color banding, and the pixelation is very apparent. I have done several comparisons with other images, and have not yet run into any noticeable problems on VERO.
6) ONLY users who you follow in your feed
This goes hand in hand with no algorithm. I’ve already mentioned that you won’t have any ads on VERO, but you also won’t find any suggested posts in your feed. It’s slick, it’s clean, it’s awesome. No, I haven’t been paid a dime to say any of this.
7) Authenticity\Community
Quite frankly, to me Instagram has become an annoying mess, and it seems they’re either trying to be everything to everyone, or have absolutely no idea what they are. I’m not quite sure what they are either. Most creators end up frustrated just trying to figure the algorithm out, and it all leads to the “Social” being taken out of “Social Media”. Let us share our work, let us see others’ work and be inspired, and be part of a community. VERO lends itself to that in many ways, and in fact it’s part of their mission. In an interview with Entrepreneur Magazine, VERO CEO Ayman Hariri said, “Our intention is really to create an online social network that mimics the greatest social network that exists, which is the one that exists between people. Our responsibility as designers and developers is to have technology be a tool for people -- to have it enhance their life experiences and not to detract from them.”
This was my first post on VERO, using the desktop app. I asked for tips, and one from a fellow photographer was “Stay genuine and have fun in this great community”. So far, I have definitely experienced more community than there has been on Instagram.
8) Chronological Feed
Yep, VERO is in some ways the Instagram from back in the good ‘ol days. Your feed is not only restricted to users you follow, but it’s in chronological order. And when you get to the end, don’t worry, you still won’t find any suggested posts. Close the app, you’re done for now, go do something else!
9) True full screen, distraction-less images
Want to view a landscape image full screen? On VERO, tap the image, rotate your phone, and voilà, it’s magic! This makes the superior image quality even more apparent, and all icons are hidden for a distraction-less viewing experience. Your work on VERO is displayed beautifully in a way that the other guys never did. This is not new technology, but something that has essentially existed since the beginning of smartphones, but for some reason we are severely limited on Instagram.
This is what you get on a landscape photo when rotating your phone on Instagram. Not even portrait photos can be viewed full screen. On VERO however, you can easily display photos full screen, and everything else will disappear for distraction-less viewing.
10) Awesome desktop app
While Instagram can be used on a web browser on any computer, using it has always been clunky for me, and several features are not available. They only fairly recently added the ability to upload photos from your computer, for example. VERO on the other hand, listened to user requests for a dedicated application on the computer. Not only does it seem all the same features from the mobile app are there, but it makes for glorious viewing of those high quality images. If Instagram allowed users to view photos at that size, a lot more people would notice the issues with image compression previously mentioned. You can download the desktop app here.
A snapshot of my feed on the VERO desktop app. Only people I follow, and photos can be maximized to be viewed in all their glory. You can download the app here for Windows or Mac.
Bonus Reasons!
If the 10 reasons above haven’t persuaded you, there’s plenty more to like on VERO. Some of these may have been mentioned under other headings above, but I’m a fan of comprehensive lists, so here we go:
11) Responsive Support
12) No Influencers (at least I haven’t seen any yet)
13) No bots\spam (at least I haven’t seen any yet)
14) Clickable Links in Posts
15) Excellent and intuitive zoom handling on photos
16) Control over who posts are shared to
17) Unlimited featured posts (similar to pinned posts on IG)
18) Filter feed to only photos or only video
19) Beautiful intuitive interface, not cluttered
20) VERO listens and responds to user complaints and feedback
Any other reasons I’m missing? If you’ve used VERO, what do you think of it so far? Let me know in the comments.
For me, it appears VERO is fulfilling their goals, and I’m going to be riding the wave whether it’s only a few months, or a decade. Tired of reading yet? Ok, let’s close this out with another quote from Hariri: “We started VERO because we felt there was a need for a new kind of social network which treats its users as customers and not as a commodity, protects their privacy and prioritizes genuine connection between people and groups over ‘engagement’. VERO is a social network built on responsible technology principles. We’re building technology and a culture to help people connect without employing the techniques that have been shown to promote addiction.”
