The Rise of Tiktok amid the Pandemic
The Rise of Tiktok amid the Pandemic
One of the most sought-after applications in smartphones is TikTok. Lasting for a few seconds to a couple of minutes, people have gone crazy over the idea of having a stage to sing, dub, or dance to stardom. With Covid-19 taking a toll on people’s jobs and recreation, Tiktok opened the opportunity for leisure and fun through social media and the rest of the world being the target audience.
The Knack that is TikTok
TikTok has been running for some years until it had its blast during the pandemic. According to its official website, TikTok is the leading destination for short-form videos or videos that are only a few seconds or minutes long. Their objective is to bring joy and inspire creativity among their users (TikTok.com, 2020). Aside from this, another objective is to use TikTok to do good. It aims to inspire and motivate the current generation to positively impact society and the planet, as TikTok is used as a platform to spread awareness (TikTok.com, 2020). It should be noted that TikTok has offices all over the world, including Los Angeles, New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore, Jakarta, Seoul, and Tokyo. Its dance hits and other trending challenges surface even beyond the site.
Confidence and TikTok
Boosting One’s Confidence through TikTok
On the other hand, the unstated objectives of this platform could be to allow people to have an avenue to build their self-confidence. It can also be a way to form a fan base as well as to kill boredom. This was apparent during the stay home periods. This application has been studied as well and it was found that a positive relationship is existing between product positioning, variety of content, perceived popularity of TikTok, and its uniqueness (Hou, 2020). This proves how TikTok can have an immense impact on users and their content.
Who uses the App?
As for its users, millennials and gen Z are the ones who usually use TikTok. In the case of gender, there might be more female users compared to male users. This is due to the videos that we see on the app and the usual performers that we see in these videos. And, in parallel to this, the usual users of TikTok are teenagers. Moreover, Asia ranks one in terms of the place where TikTok is highly used (Iqbal, 2020). Matching with our brainstorming, females are more likely to be users of TikTok compared to males.
The roles can usually be divided between the performer and the audience. These roles may swap from time to time since performers are also part of the audience whenever possible. The formal role as stated on the website is the creator (TikTok.com, 2020.). These refer to all users of the app if they create videos. For our brainstorming, we just practically made the general role more specific, but the term used by TikTok is more encompassing and more accurate.
The TikTok Rules
These will have rules to follow. The officer states that it intends to encourage creativity and happiness. The website of the application states that dangerous individuals and forms of terrorism are barred from the site. Illegal activities and goods are also not permitted as well as the use of weapons, promotion of criminal activities, violence, self-harm, harassment, bullying and other morally unacceptable deeds (TikTok.com, 2020.). These are explicitly stated in detail on the website. On the other hand, the unwritten rule in this avenue is to keep your videos entertaining. It should be funny or inspiring or entertaining. The people should look their best in their videos as well. Aside from this, editing is a must.
The Magical Ingredients for the TikTok Experience
Lastly, the tools needed for the use of this app include a smartphone, a headset, and an internet connection. Others will not even need headsets anymore. If I were to explain this app to someone who never heard about it, I would say that this can be downloaded through App Store or Google Play. He/she should investigate the trending songs or music that he/she wants to dance to. He/she should practice first as well. After that, they could edit the video and then upload the video on TikTok afterward. The application is not demanding making it easy to use for many people.
References
"Community Guidelines". Tiktok.Com, 2020, https://www.tiktok.com/community-guidelines?lang=en.
"Join Tiktok". Careers. Tiktok.Com, 2020, https://careers.tiktok.com/.
Hou, Liqian. (2020)." Study on The Perceived Popularity of Tiktok". Bangkok University: Thailand. www.dspace.bu.ca
Iqbal, Ansoor. (2020), "Tiktok Revenue and Usage Statistics (2020)". Business of Apps, https://www.businessofapps.com/data/tik-tok-statistics/.
