This is Casey Neistat. He’s a 34-year-old film director and producer who runs a successful YouTube channel. You can spot him doing his morning jog along the Hudson River or speeding through the streets of Manhattan on his latest addition to what he calls his growing collection of “unnecessary motorized vehicular personal transport systems.”
Casey is probably one of the busiest people on the planet, but he has been extra busy lately. Casey just launched an app that he co-founded with Tumblr’s former VP of Engineering and Head of Brand Strategy & Marketing, Matt Hackett. The two creative minds have come together to give us Beme (pronounced "beam"), which is aimed towards sharing social media with a higher dose of reality as opposed to the careful framing, filters and editing that we are so used to implementing.
Beme uses the proximity sensor on the iPhone as a recording button. When you cover the sensor by putting your phone against a surface, like your chest or a wall, Beme automatically records and uploads a short video clip. Instead of seeing what you’re taking a picture of through the phone screen, you keep your eyes on whatever you were excited to share on social media.
Casey's Beme launch video:
In his Beme launch video, Casey explains how we capture what we want to share on social media with our phones up in our face (left) and how Beme is different in that it lets you keep experiencing the moment with the help of the proximity sensor (right).
In the video, Casey emphasizes how he wants us to be able to, “keep staring at the sunset and…keep watching the rock concert.” That statement crossed my mind about a dozen times at a concert that I was at the other night. My entire view was blocked by hundreds of iPhones and everybody had their eyes looking up at their screens, even though the singer and the band were a mere 20 feet away from them at eye-level. In that moment I wished that all of these concert-goers had Beme. Not only would I have been able to see more than the top of the singer’s head, the entire crowd would’ve been enjoying more of the concert in real life, not through their iPhones.
In a world where perfectly framed selfies and strategically cropped photos are all the rage, Casey Neistat stands up for authenticity and embracing life as it is. While not everyone may be convinced that Beme is the next-big-thing, I think that Casey teaches us a valuable lesson. Sometimes the things that we think are worth sharing are often the moments that are the most beautiful, momentous or just plain funny. With Beme, we’re able to more fully enjoy those experiences instead of missing them as we’re too busy choosing a Snapchat filter or thinking about the perfect time to post.
Casey also talks about how Beme is all about bridging an “uncanny valley” between real life and the carefully curated social media we have become accustomed to.
We’re all guilty of this self-consciousness of sharing on social media, as we are inclined to showcase a perfect version of ourselves. Casey has a point, though. Maybe it’s better for us to keep our eyes up at the world around us and to be unafraid to document life with a little more authenticity. So cheers to less screen time and more sharing.
