WeAre8 social network paying users to watch ads launches in Australia, takes on Facebook

Facebook’s latest rival, created by an Aussie, will pay users who join up and watch videos for just eight minutes. See how it works.

Exclusive: An Australian female tech founder is launching an alternative to Facebook with a major twist — users will be paid for watching ads on the network.

The unique take on social media, designed to disrupt the domination of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok, has launched quietly in Australia after four months in the United Kingdom.

WeAre8 has already attracted major advertisers as well as poaching executives from Channel 9 and TikTok, and is expected to recruit local celebrities in the coming weeks.

Swinburne University social media senior lecturer Dr Belinda Barnet said the concept was “laudable” although warned it could struggle to win attention from its giant social media competitors.

WeAre8 founder Sue Fennessy, an Australian entrepreneur based in London, said she felt a responsibility to build a platform with a difference or, as she called it, “social media that gets money in your wallet”.

WeAre8 founder and Australian entrepreneur Sue Fennessy.

Ms Fennessy said advertising on social networks like Facebook was “broken,” in that it stopped users from seeing posts from their friends and attracted little attention from frustrated users.

“How do we get little bits of money into people’s bank accounts and help people reclaim their value? It’s to shift the money,” she said.

“If we can build a better way to deliver a digital ad that guarantees your attention and leaves you feeling really loved, we’re going to be able to shift that $100 billion back to people and the planet.”

People who sign up to WeAre8 are called 8Citizens and are offered ads to watch each day, where they are paid for their attention and money is also contributed to a charity.

Rates paid to users vary, but sit around 30 cents for watching one minute of advertising, and users can choose to cash in their money or donate it to a charity.

WeAre8’s main feed looks like a cross between Instagram and TikTok with one big difference: users are only served eight minutes of curated content each day, preventing them spending too much time scrolling.

Ms Fennessy said this was a deliberate move to provide a healthier and more connected form of social media.

“People are spending, on average, four hours a day every day on social (media) which equates to between two and three months of their lives every year on social scrolling and not feeling particularly good,” she said.

“We’re not saying get off (Instagram or Facebook), just start your day with us. Eight minutes on 8, reconnected with people you love, and make some change in the world.”

WeAre8 launched in the UK four months’ ago, where it signed up former Premier League star Rio Ferdinand as a spokesperson.

Its Australian operation, which is headed by former Nine Entertainment veteran Lizzie Young, is expected to sign up local celebrities as spokespeople over the coming weeks.

Dr Barnet said the new social network was launching in Australia at an opportune time, when Facebook and Instagram were “haemorrhaging users” and “people are looking for change in online advertising”.

But she warned it would be difficult for WeAre8 or any newcomer to compete with the tech giants for a significant share of the market.

“They’ve got some very laudable philosophies behind the project, particularly this idea that users could volunteer to see advertising and not have it forced upon them,” she said.

“Just looking at new social networks, like Truth Social and Parler, the survival rate is not so good. Actually scaling and getting a foothold in the market might be difficult.”

Originally published as WeAre8 social network paying users to watch ads launches in Australia, takes on Facebook