Tik Tok:- A Critical Review

Introduction:-

If one search the question on any search engine that what is Tik Tok, one can get a list what is Tik Tok, with whole Beginners guide, that how one can be a celebrity through this social platform, how one can improve their number of views and likes on their videos, how one can pose their videos for better results, etc. These outcomes clearly show the popularity of this app worldwide. In India only, there are 200 million users daily terms, it is known as the short video- sharing social platform based on lip-syncing, which limits it to 60 seconds, where one can use filters, music, animations, any editing, special effects and many more.  It is accessible on both IOS and Android Operating systems, where one can view different videos on their previous views that are formed through ‘Artificial Intelligence’. Gradually, this is becoming popular with the increase in numbers of users on a daily basis that impacted the whole population in various issues, socially, mentally, physically, and even in the form of national security threats.

What is Tik Tok:-

According to ByteDance’s website, ‘Tik Tok is the first company to launch mobile-first products powered by machine learning technology’. This is founded in the attempt to make Artificial intelligence work towards the growth of mobile internet to make the time worth of people spending on the internet, by making it informative. Tik Tok consists of audios which were later combined by the video of the users, with any filters and editing users wanted in that. As this Social platform has an open category, here videos could be of any genre Romance, hobbies, fitness, travel, music, dance, Photography, education, business etc.

According to The Oprah Magazine, Bulky of users are in-between 16 to 24 years old, but gradually, this extends to all age groups. Not only kids and young people, even celebrities like Reese Witherspoon, Jimmy Fallon, Will Smith etc are active on this social platform. There are various grounds through which Tik Tok acquire popularity in such a shorter span i.e.; it is endorsed by the Celebrity, despite being a global app it contains localised content, it’s easy to operate this app.

Where it all started:-

In 2012, Zhang Yiming, the Chinese internet Entrepreneur based in Beijing, founded the company named Byte Dance. This company launched an app named Tik Tok in September 2015, which is known as Douyin in its parent country (China). This is the app for making and sharing Short videos, which is free to use worldwide. The app was an instantaneous hit which hit millennial soon and became Popular worldwide. In November 2017, Tik Tok acquired, musically, the US-based company, worth $ 800 million, who played the role of their rivalry. 

According to Sensor Tower Store Intelligence’s latest estimates, it is downloaded more than 2 billion times globally while there are more than 500 million users of Tik Tok, in which more than 200 million users are from India; that makes this app, the most popular social media app in the country.

Impact of Tik Tok:-

●       Efficacious Impact:-

✔      Apart from being a Social Platform, Tik Tok is also seen as the wide platform for Marketing as it helps in Brand advertisement. Various brands like NBA, The Washington Post, NBC news etc promoting them with the help of this platform, as well as Brand takeover Ads, In-feed Native Video Ads, Branded Hashtag challenges are quite beneficial for Business Promotions.

✔      As Tik Tok is the Open Platform, it is often used to showcase the creativity of the world. There was various hidden creativity in the world, which lacked the platform, this app benefitted to those.

✔      It plays a vital role in money-making for various individuals, who treat this social platform as their source of income. This platform makes them work as a team, where one has the responsibility of editing the video, one is the theme creator while some are acting under them.

✔      This platform also positively impacted by helping people gain their self- confidence and grooming sense by showing what they are good at.

●       Dissenting Impact:-

✔      Every Social Platform built in that way, where the human brain gets easily attracted, which leads them to view one after another, this kills the Precious time of the individuals, which can be used in some productive things. Long hours on this platform also leads to mental freeze, where one will not be in the state of mind to detect why he/she is watching this!

✔      As this social platform is used to make videos, which showcase wealth through clothes, luxuries etc, causes depression and mental stress to those who are not eligible to take all these. This makes viewers unsatisfactory towards their life, which later on changes into a huge loss of mental Peace and promotes issues like self- harm or eating disorders. 

✔      It Consists of various Audios, which are abusive and obscene in nature, which puts a negative impact on the mind of kids and young generation who uses these audios in daily basis, they lip-sync these words without even knowing what they are saying, this feature makes them learn what they are not meant to learn.

✔      This platform increases the chances of cyberbullying, as individuals make fun of each other’s contents with various negative comments that make them feel socially unwanted.

✔      As this Social platform limits the video until 60 seconds only, this somehow divested the concentration power of the human brain. This leads to the largest denial in the concentration availability of the brain, which negatively impacts all the other productive works of human beings. 

Status Quo:-

On 29^th June, 2020, Tik Tok with 58 others app, banned by The Indian Government invoking their power given under section 69A, Information Technology, 2002 and Information Technology (Procedure and Safeguard for blocking of access of information by Public) Rules, 2009. Commenced from the Indo- China ongoing border conflicts (Galwan Valley, Ladakh), furthermore obtaining a sample of confidential reports and suggestions from Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Center and the Ministry of Home Affairs that states these apps are a threat to sovereignty and integrity towards national security and Defence of India.

This leads the government of India to prohibit the use of these apps nationwide in both mobile and non- mobile internet devices. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology instructed Google and Apple to eliminate these applications for this locality on their play stores and also directed Internet Service Provider and Telecom Operators to disable access on their respective networks.

Conclusion:-

We are still at the very beginning of the internet, let’s use it wisely.

                                                                                                                           Jimmy Wales

The Popularity of the Tik Tok is growing continuously, making this social platform of net worth $75 billion. In a nutshell, this app has that much potential that leads them to the next big marketing and social media platform. There’s not any second thought that this app is really fun and creative in their contents, but the impact also couldn’t be denied, that it is somehow harmful to human social, mental and physical health. Generation ‘X’ is somehow addicted to this platform. Asia is one of the continents to use this platform more than any other continent.

We are living in the era, where one has access to all the searches they want in one go, this puts a positive as well as negative pressure on the mind, that left us with the choice, that what one wants to see, are available to them, but Let’s be wiser in the way of information, you are giving to your brains.

This social platform left, with some of the questions, which are yet to be answered, like Is this app a threat to the national security of India! How will the ban affect Tik Tok, in the country, where there’s such a large number of users! Is this ban put monetary threats on Tik Tok influencers!

By: Suman Rathore