What is Vero? And why is everyone on Instagram talking about it?

There’s an app on the block called Vero, which could soon be touted as a ‘Facebook Killer’. The social media platform, which soared in popularity over the weekend, claims to be a less-cluttered version of Facebook.

In practice, the app lets users share text and URLs, as well as recommendations for books, TV shows, and movies. The app also has a messaging service and a shortcut for its notifications center.

The company, which uses the slogan, “less social media, more social life” recently released a new offer of “free membership for life” for its first million users. On the contrary, Vero went down after a surge in new users caused connection issues. Vero issued a statement, “We’re experiencing an outage due to heavy load. We are working to resume normal service as soon as possible.”

Vero, which translates to ‘truth’ in Esperanto was originally launched in 2015, by Lebanese billionaire Ayman Hariri, movie financier Motaz Nabulsi and venture capitalist Scott Birnbaum.

What’s different about Vero?

The biggest difference between other social networks (Facebook, Instagram) and Vero is that the service does not use algorithms to target users. Nor, does it follow traditional advertising. It relies on a to-be-launched subscription model. Most importantly, Vero chooses a reverse-chronological feed and does not list posts algorithmically.  The company will also charge merchants, when they wish to sell a commodity with a ‘buy now’ button.

Vero is also very simple to use. While signing up, the app only asks for a user’s phone number, name, and email for registration purpose.

A Vero spokesperson told Inverse that “It’s no surprise that our users have galvanized to introduce the app to their communities and send Vero to the top of the charts. Over the past few days, we’ve jumped from #19 to #3 on the US iTunes Social Networking charts, and have cracked the top 10 list of Free Apps—and our users continue to increase daily.”

According to the report, Vero markets itself as a palate cleanser to Facebook, which has seen its reputation dented and dinged after scandals over Russian political disruptors and persistent theories that Facebook is secretly listening to users for advertising purposes.