With just days until the biggest social media platforms start kicking off users they deem to be under 16, kids are flocking to new apps to get their connected fix. Under lifestyle apps in the App Store there’s a couple of key standouts right now – Lemon8 and YOPE.

Lemon8, which is owned by TikTok will be age restricted next week. While the government hasn’t called it out, it is on platform (app) providers to self-assess their service and it’s pretty clear Lemon8 meets the guidelines as a Social Media app and must be age restricted. EFTM understands from TikTok that Lemon8 will be enforcing age assurance on its users on or before the deadline on December 10.

However Yope is a different kettle of fish.

EFTM reached out to Yope’s Co-Founder and CEO Bahram Ismailau who seemed very clear on the app’s classification. “Yope clearly falls under the exemptions in the legislation and does not qualify as a social media service. Why? Because in practice Yope is a fully private messenger with zero public content. Every user manually adds friends or approves incoming requests, which means they have complete control over who can message them or send them photos. No random strangers. A simple example: it works the same way as adding someone to your contacts in WhatsApp or iMessage. Only after that can they message you. You stay in control. That is the core of how Yope works.”

Having downloaded and used Yope, I tend to agree.

In addition, as Ismailau points out, “Yope has no algorithmic feed of any kind. You never see unexpected or unsolicited content, because you fully control who is allowed to communicate with you. You can’t even send a message on Yope unless both people are friends, let alone share photos or videos. There is no feed, no public posts. We see this as absolutely essential – it’s the reason Yope was created in the first place.“

Sharing among friends and family is the goal he says – “Our mission is simple: create a place where people can safely share their lives with close friends and family without drowning in trash content or ads like on major platforms such as Instagram or Snap. This needed to be fixed. We believe nearly a billion people today are waiting for a product like Yope – so we’re building it.”

When you look at the eSafety comissioner’s own flow chart for platform self assessment, Yope makes it all the way to Question 7 :

But, as Snapchat would have hoped for themselves, Yope is NOT an age-restricted social media platform because it answers YES to “Sole or primary purpose of enabling communication by messaging”.

Snapchat argued, and continues to contest that they are a messaging platform.

While frankly, that’s all most teens use Snapchat for – the fact is there’s loads of public and algorithmic content on Snapchat, so it has to fall under the ban.

Yope allows me to upload photos every day, it creates photo collages of my friends, and allows me to invite friends, but no public can see my photos unless I accept you as a friend – that’s a pretty private experience, and leans into messaging far more than social media.

It reminds me of BeReal in fact, which – interestingly, my daughter requested to download yesterday – so perhaps that’s on the way back too!

Yope CEO Bahram Ismailau told EFTM “There are billions of people who want to share moments of their lives with their close friends and families but simply can’t. Social networks stopped being social networks – they became content platforms. Modern “social media” doesn’t care whether you stay connected with the people who matter to you. They care only about monetizing your attention by keeping you scrolling through content from people you don’t know and never chose to follow. Yope set out to fix that and create a space where you can share memories with the people you care about safely, privately, and without platform pressure like on Instagram or Snap. No comparisons, no public profiles, no judgment from strangers – a fully private, fully controlled environment.“

“Yope isn’t made for watching content, becoming popular, or chasing views – none of that is even possible in Yope. You know what it is for? Seeing what your friends and family are up to, every day – and sharing your own life with them. That’s why I love this app. And this is why Yope is as safe as WhatsApp or the native iMessage on an iPhone”

But what about the future? Lots of the best apps today were fun when they started until advertising and algorithms took over. I put this to Ismailau, asking – how will the app survive, how do you plan to make money?

He told me “We’re planning to offer a whole set of unique features and capabilities for the user – a premium subscription for content storage, personalization, and additional tools built around your personal content. Think about it: we all pay for iCloud, right? Just imagine, collectively we pay Apple around $30B a year! And no one has ever tried to compete with them – we’re going to try. And we want to deliver a modern, high-value service packed with real benefits for the user.“

Going on to clarify “this will be a freemium model – every user can enjoy the product for free. But those who want a bit more in terms of special features and personalization will be able to upgrade to premium“

So, is Yope the future? Maybe, is it one you should let your kids use? Your call.

But like all apps, games, and social media, my advice is the same, if you’re letting the kids on – then you should be on there too – add them as friends so you can see what they are sharing.. Simple.