With containment, this Chinese social network has gained many followers, including the media. A dazzling success despite a data management condemned in court and suspicions of control by the intelligence services of Beijing. After India, Donald Trump is considering a ban.
Donald Trump announced on Friday 31 July that he would ban TikTok in the United States, which Washington suspects could be used by Chinese intelligence. At a time when the New York Times is talking about a possible takeover by Microsoft. And even though on 1 June last, a former Disney employee took over as head of what is identified by a sort of musical note. Kevin Mayer, 58, was previously in charge of the American entertainment giant’s streaming platforms. Accused of encouraging pornography and paedophilia, the app had already been banned once in India in April 2019 and has recently been banned again due to tensions with China. The setbacks are piling up for this increasingly successful Chinese social network. Owned by Chinese Zhang Yiming, CEO of the Chinese technology company ByteDance, the former Music.ly has conquered almost one billion users in just four years. An impressive success, especially among teenagers. More recently, stars, brands, media and politicians such as Emmanuel Macron or Jean-Luc Mélenchon have joined this network for exchanging short videos, which has also come under a lot of criticism, condemned in February 2019 to the highest fine in a case of violation of the American law on the protection of children’s privacy on the Internet.
One of the most downloaded apps in the world, ahead of Facebook
TikTok was launched in autumn 2017, with an international version of Douyin (its Chinese name) having appeared in China in 2016. It is a short video sharing app. In 2018, its parent company, the ByteDance Group, bought Musical.ly for nearly $1 billion, an app that is particularly popular among young Europeans, on which 13 million clips are posted every day. TikTok and Muscal.ly merge and TikTok quickly becomes one of the most downloaded apps in the world.
In 2019, TikTok is even the second most downloaded app in the world, behind WhatsApp but ahead of Messenger, Facebook and Instagram, according to Sensor Tower, a traffic analysis company.
Recently, the Covid-19 crisis and the Black Lives Matter movement have further boosted the social network’s user base. In January, TikTok had 800 million members, now it is approaching one billion. The app recorded its best quarter ever at the beginning of 2020, according to Sensor Tower, which reports 315 million downloads in three months, taking it past the two billion mark in total downloads.
Some videos are reaching astronomical numbers. For example, videos with #Trump total over two billion views! With the phenomenon of Sarah Cooper’s impersonations.
After the death of George Floyd, the social network took on an unprecedented political scope with hundreds of thousands of messages linked to the denunciation of police violence and racism.
Thibault Le Ouay, founder of a company that supports brands in their marketing strategy on TikTok and interviewed by AFP, explains that the advantage of the platform is that it does not require a polished setting, an idyllic holiday location as is the case on Instagram. Analyst Debra Aho Williamson tells AFP that “videos [on TikTok] are generally quite light and humorous. With all the negative information you hear elsewhere, people need that right now. That’s enough to convince teenagers, but also parents (and even senior citizens, as in this video) to join the platform, as this France 3 report tells us, where the owner of a ready-to-wear shop became a regular on TikTok to “keep in touch with her customers” and the nurses at the Rouen University Hospital took advantage of a rare break to make a video. Moreover, with the coronavirus pandemic, the platform set up the #happyathome to encourage respect for containment around the world, a message seen more than 7.9 billion times. The social network also announced a $250 million donation to support healthcare workers, teachers and other professionals affected by the pandemic.
After teenagers, celebrities and media on TikTok
With the containment, many celebrities have joined the platform, also looking for occupation. This is the case of actress Jane Fonda, 82, who has posted three videos in which she calls for climate action against a backdrop of physical exercise. The famous young tennis player Coco Gauff also posted a message in tribute to George Floyd and against racism: “Am I next?
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In France, YouTubers Norman and Squeezie arrived on the social network during the lockdown, as did TV host Jean-Luc Reichmann. Others have been on the network for several months, such as singers Mariah Carey, Jennifer Lopez, Selena Gomez, Justin Bieber, or rappers Bigflo and Oli from Toulouse, who have more than 777,000 subscribers but question their presence on the social network in their profile “We’re already too old for this app aren’t we?” The majority of the members of the social network are indeed teenagers, even pre-teens…
TikTok sometimes allows certain artists to relaunch themselves or their work to enjoy new success. The track “Moon” by Marseille-based electro artist Kid Francescoli, for example, saw a peak in listeners last winter, even though it dates from 2017, according to AFP… The clip now has more than 16 million views on YouTube, after generating more than 686,000 videos on TikTok, thanks to the phrase “and it went like”, which has been taken up and staged by thousands of anonymous people or celebrities such as the American star Dwayne Johnson, nicknamed The Rock, who has some 25 million subscribers on TikTok
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This was also the fate of Doja Cat, a 24-year-old American singer, when last December a young girl (Haley Sharpe on the social network) who had been a member of TikTok for just two months posted a choreographed video of her song “Say so” on the social network. The teenager’s video was a hit and has been viewed over a million times, with the choreography being featured in over 20 million videos on TikTok, including by Will Smith. And this has allowed Doja Cat’s song to reach the top of the Billboard charts, as told by Quotidien. The American star even added Haley Sharpe’s choreography to his clip!
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And when they are not dancing, the “TikTokeurs” generally post challenges, light or humorous videos, not always of great interest to the average Internet user. However, some media have decided to invest in the field. In May 2019, Julien Mielcarek, the editorial director of BFMTV.com explained to Le Figaro that “TikTok is the most effective way to reach pre-teens”. TF1, Konbini and Brut are also among the media present on the platform. Brut, which has a following of almost 150,000, broadcasts short informative videos.
Gala magazine, also a member, only offers videos of stars. Gala’s objective is “to provide snapshots of stars, to be as close as possible to them. We’re really trying to show people who don’t have access to these parties what goes on behind the scenes and how the stars behave,” Alex Marras, head of Gala’s social media department, told Europe 1 in early April. A recipe that works, since from 700,000 subscribers in April, Gala’s account is now followed by more than one million people. Even the Washington Post and its humorous videos don’t do as well, the American newspaper, which reminds us on its account that it is “a paper newspaper”, has nearly 520,000 subscribers. For its part, TikTok does not hesitate to approach the media directly, including France Culture…
During the pandemic, the WHO (World Health Organisation) also used TikTok to combat misinformation: a way of reaching teenagers. The head of social media at the WHO, Aleksandra Kuzmanovic, explained that she “adapted some of the video products to fit TikTok, which is usually seen as a fun platform”.
The platform is also used by some brands: the #haribo has generated videos viewed some 247 million times.
Advertising is the main source of revenue for the platform. In France, monetisation was launched at the end of November 2019, allowing brands to integrate directly into the content created and shared by users thanks to different formats. In particular, video can be offered as soon as the app is opened or in the member’s video recommendations. There are also “sponsored effects” that allow the creation of customised filters and special effects.
The ten most followed French people on TikTok in July 2020.
An application criticised in particular for its data management and its links with Beijing
TikTok has regularly been accused of not respecting the privacy of younger people. In the US, in February 2019, the Federal Trade Commission, the US trade regulator, fined the platform a record $5.7 million for illegally collecting personal data from minors. The organisations behind the complaint believe that one year after this decision, “TikTok has failed to delete previously collected personal information about minors and continues to collect this information without notifying or seeking parental consent”.
The social network responded by saying that it takes privacy seriously and is “committed to ensuring that TikTok remains a safe and fun network for our users”. In spring 2019, India temporarily suspended the app, accusing it of encouraging pornography. A network where the hypersexualisation of teenagers is also decried, because in these videos, many young people adopt suggestive outfits and positions, as denounced by the YouTubers “The Rat King” in 2018.
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A scandal broke out in mid-June 2020 in France via the hashtag #Balancetontiktokeur. Thousands of young girls are highlighting harassment on the network, for example by being blackmailed with nude photos. And the Secretary of State for Equality between Women and Men and the Fight against Discrimination, Marlène Schiappa, is calling out those responsible. “For the moment, on TikTok, it’s a jungle!” she denounces.
Tik Tok says there is a barrier to entry, but it’s not a barrier but a box to tick. You have a lot of kids who are 10 or 12 years old creating accounts.
A partnership with helplines is being considered.
Another concern raised, particularly in the United States, is the idea that TikTok could be exploited by Chinese intelligence services. This includes an investigation by CFIUS, the US agency responsible for ensuring that foreign investments do not pose a risk to national security. One senator even proposed a bill to ban TikTok from the phones of members of the US government. The app refuted these accusations in November, explaining to Le Point that its “data centres are not located in China” and therefore “no data from TikTok is subject to Chinese law”.
These fears for national security, and concerns about privacy, were put forward by India to justify its second ban, very recently, after diplomatic and military tensions with China. A major business setback for TikTok.
On Wednesday 29 July, in a blog post, its boss, Kevin Mayer, said: “We are not political, we do not accept political advertising and we do not have an agenda. Our only goal is to remain a lively and dynamic platform enjoyed by all.
The app has also been accused of censoring content from people with disabilities or those deemed ugly or poor. This is in addition to accusations of censorship of certain political content, as denounced by a 17-year-old American girl who had her account suspended on TikTok after she spoke about the fate of Uighurs in China. TikTok had justified this suspension by another reason (an image of Bin Laden disseminated in a previous post by the teenager), before restoring access and claiming that it did not moderate content according to political sensitivities.
