Is there a shift in social media on the horizon? Elon Musk is days away from acquiring Twitter and ending the censorship the site was most famous for, and right now, the hottest new app, especially for teenagers, is a new social media app named “GAS” that is going viral, spreading amongst high schoolers around the country.
What’s different? Its purpose is to compliment other people, or as GAS says, it lets kids “post each other app.”
The app is different than what you are used to with the prominent ones. On GAS, you do not post content; you instead interact with polls. Identities are kept anonymous so you can let people know you have a crush on them, but they won’t know who it is. An upgraded version of the service called the God mode takes away anonymity.
There’s no direct messaging with the app, and the creators of it say that is intentional because they wanted to build a “place that makes us feel better about ourselves and show others there are people who love and admire you.”
The founders are Nikita Bier, who created a similar app called TBH that Facebook acquired in 2017 but shut down in 2018, former Facebook engineer Dave Shatz, and Isaiah Turner.
The app is #1 on the Apple app store but is only available to download in 12 states. The Wall Street Journal said it would be available nationwide soon.
There’s been a rumor spread across TikTok and Snapchat that GAS is involved in human trafficking, which led to 3% of users deleting their accounts in one day. A top Google Search recently has been “is gas a sex trafficking app,” which is a horrible obstacle for a new company to try and overcome if it’s false.
Bier said there are already 1 million daily active users and gets 30,000 new users per hour.
Experts tend to agree that the app is safe for teens, but it triggers a dopamine cycle that constantly trains teens to check their phones for validation. Yes, the founders say boosting self-esteem was their mission, but it could become addictive for some.
Add comment