You Make Friends by Asking Questions

Everyone knows that social media is terrible, and everyone knows there are many reasons why. My strong conviction here is that an underappreciated aspect of social’s general enshittification is baked into how we all use existing platforms. That is, every social media platform is designed for people to provide answers, rather than a place to learn something.

On social everyone has a take—how everything is bad, or how awesome Taylor Swift’s new album is, or why kale is actually bad for you. When someone is on social media “just asking questions,” we all know at this point that that is the last thing that person is actually trying to do.

So one of the things that I’ve really loved in working on Rover these past few months is how it inverts that dynamic, and what it means for social interactions. An example: A few months ago I was thinking “I wonder what Beth Moore has been up to lately?” and so I asked Rover, which nicely gave me a 5 minute audio brief on her life over the past few years. Which was great—satisfied my curiosity and got me up to speed on what she’s been up to since leaving the Southern Baptists in 2021.

The really great part, though, came after—Josh listed to my brief, and asked my “How do you know about Beth Moore?” and we had a nice talk about our similar childhood experiences growing up in the Baptist Church. Now, Josh and I have been friends for 15 years, and yet we learned something new about each other through a question that I asked on Rover.

That to me is the real power and potential here—a social network based on humans learning about each other through the questions they ask, rather than talking past each other, is one I want to be a part of. Maybe you do too? Join us!