YOU don’t have to be a Justin Bieber fan – a Belieber – to use his new social networking app. But you do have to take selfies. Lots of selfies.

Pop superstars aren’t famous for being shy and Justin Bieber even less than most. So it’s perhaps not surprising that the lad has just launched a new social network dedicated to the art of self-promotion: the selfie snap.

For those readers not yet aware of the term selfie, it is a self-portrait photograph, usually taken with a smartphone. Selfies can be moody, they can be silly. They’re often taken with friends or celebrities in shot.

It’s all about: “Look at me and who I’m with!”

Bieber’s network, called Shots of Me (shots.me) is an app (on iOS only for the time being), and to its credit it goes to great lengths to stamp out any traces of cyberbullying or trolling.

There’s a real-time feed of new selfies, and you can fave the ones you like. If you follow a particular user, they can send you a direct message, but there’s no comments box that’s wide open to abuse.

Needless to say, Justin Bieber didn’t sit down and write the code for this app.

He invested big money in it, being a big fan of selfies and being known to take them while performing on stage.

If he can convince just a fraction of his millions of Twitter followers to download the new app, it will be a huge success.

Do we need another social network, though? You can do selfies on Facebook or Instagram already, but there are signs teenagers are drifting away from Facebook because their parents use it too; and you have to wade through a lot of pictures on Instagram before you see a selfie, let alone like one.

So if selfies are where the kids are at, maybe Bieber’s jumped in at just the right time.

Shots of him might be all that’s needed to make Shots of Me a global hit.