I'm on both sites. I cam late to the Vocal party, having joind at the end of February, 2021. That said, I do wish there were more contests geard toward non-ficton writers. I've tried fiction. I write a little of it, but it's not prize worthy. I've won 3 challenges (2 firsts, 1 second place), all of them were non fiction, rambling type, stories of my life type things. Then I placed in 2 others, the fiction awards and the Ukraine thing they did. I don't mind the site and with my free year, I've committed mysself to entering every challenge, even the fiction ones. I can tell you I'm certainly not there for the reads.

As for the Facebook groups, some are better than others. But there are indeed a lot of childish egos out there lurking in them. I 've made a few friends in a couple of them and other than that, I just sort of stay out of the drama unless it directly affects me.