Creating Something Out of Nothing, Only to Destroy It

One of my favorite bands, Norma Jean, has a song titled "Creating Something Out of Nothing, Only to Destroy It." Recently I've been checking out Beme, a new social media app by Casey Neistat. The other day, today, as I recorded a quick video of packing for the airport, Norma Jean's song, and specifically the title, came unbidden to mind.

Beme follows a sort of Snapchat-esque style towards its content. You record video for 4 seconds and it is fired off in to other peoples' feeds. You can chain together multiple 4 second clips for a longer video, but there's still no review, and most importantly, no way to save what you recorded. For the watchers, they can watch what you record by holding down their thumb. Reactions are sent as little snapshots of the front facing camera on the phone. But once they watch it, it's gone from their feed.

I suppose it makes me all old and crotchety or whatever, but this rubs me the wrong way a little bit. I love Beme; I think it's a blast being able to have little snapshots in to other peoples' lives. But the fleeting nature of the videos means that all of these little snapshots are here for a moment, then gone. Maybe it's the historian in me or maybe I just "don't get it", but the idea that all this video content is being created and then rapidly discarded makes me almost a little sad.

People are opening these windows in to their lives and then closing them almost as quickly. Maybe that's a good thing, as it can keep things lighthearted, which is useful for a social network. I'll definitely keep using Beme, it's fun. But maybe I'll also start thinking about a way to capture some of these videos for later viewing as well.