First Posted: 3/18/2013
If you haven’t heard of Pheed, you’re behind the times.
In an already diverse and growing environment of Twitters, Facebooks and Pinterests, it’s hard to stand out, but a new up-and-coming platform called Pheed, which was launched in October, stands out from the rest.
Pheed, like Facebook and other social media platforms, allows users to share any kind of content, whether it be video, photo, text, or audio.
But that’s where the similarities end and everything takes on a twist.
Like Facebook, you can show that you support or appreciate things, but in the world of Pheed, you click an “I love this” button. You can also do the equivalent of “Unlike” – the button says, “I don’t love this.”
You can bookmark things, and you can also use a function called “remix,” which Twitter users will quickly see is a lot like “re-tweeting.” Like Twitter, Pheed also supports hashtags – #nyc for posts related to New York City, for example.
Pheed also supports live broadcasts, similar to UStream.
Uniquely, you can also like via Facebook or push out Facebook status updates, create a new tweet or re-tweet existing content via Twitter, or e-mail content from Pheed.
From the looks of it, the Pheed people are positioning themselves as a “one-stop” destination, where membership grants you the ability to push content out to your other social media accounts without having to leave Pheed. Something that makes Pheed really stand out are its content and business models.
While Pheed is free for everyone to use, artists, performers, or other content creators have the option of charging for access to certain content, like live performances. Users can also charge people to view their content, with Pheed itself taking a revenue share from premium accounts. Using this business model, Pheed’s creators hope to avoid adding advertising of any kind to the platform.
Pheed is becoming increasingly popular, and last month, it reached the slot of the No. 1 most downloaded app in the Apple App store.
The social media platform’s largest audience is the 18-25 age bracket, which analysts report is starting to become disenchanted with Facebook.
Signing up for Pheed is simple. You can go to pheed.com and use your existing Facebook or Twitter login to get started. You’re required to subscribe to at least three other Pheed users just to get started, which helps ensure that your page is well-populated.
The interface could best be described as a mashup of Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr.
The actual “pheed” itself dominates the center-right of the page, similar to Twitter. A bar down the left side shows your Timeline, favorited items, subscribers and friends, and trending hashtags.
Despite Pheed being merely the latest “Next Big Social Media Site” in a long line of them – MySpace, Facebook, Tumblr, etc. – there seems to be something different about the platform, and they’re certainly generating buzz.
Pheed is available as both a website, pheed.com, and as an iPhone app available in the App Store.
