Week 12: Diffusion of Innovations

TikToks Rise: Tiktok is a viral video sharing app that has become extremely popular in the last 6 months. TikTok is popular among teenagers and is a platform where users share short videos. These videos can be anything and are up to whatever the user decides to create. For example, some videos are lip syncs, dances, or comical skits. Currently, TikTik has over 1.5 billion downloads and its popularity continues to grow. TikTok is a Chinese company but started with a different name (Musical.ly) and has gone through a few changes since it first came out. 

TikTok was originally only popular among the younger. generation until the past 6-8 months. This younger generation would be considered the early adopters, around pre-teen age and used the app when it was under its previous name "Musical.ly" and around its earlier stages. The early majority adopters would be high school aged kids, this group of adopters started using the app earlier in 2019. Late majority adopters would be college kids. Personally, I downloaded the app around 7 months ago. Laggards would be anyone in their mid to late 20's. The reason behind older users (late teens and up) catching onto the spread of the app was due to influencers and the comedic videos people their age started creating. 

The negative sides of TikTok are similar to those of any other popular social media app. TikTok has a "for you" page section of the app where videos are "funneled to a vast audience based on secret criteria".  TikTok moderators pick and chose what appears in someones "for you" page and there seems to be guidelines for who appears (people who are "good-looking", well dressed, have an attractive background of where the video was filmed). Additionally, TikTok users spend a lot of time on the app without even noticing due to the easiness of scrolling through never ending videos. The app has noticed this and places videos made by sponsors telling users to "take a break the videos will be there later". 

Overall, TikTok's rise to fame this year has been impressive. The app brings people closer together and is especially popular during this Covid-19 time. 

https://theintercept.com/2020/03/16/tiktok-app-moderators-users-discrimination/

https://www.businessinsider.com/tiktok-app-online-website-video-sharing-2019-7#think-of-bytedance-headquartered-in-beijing-china-as-chinas-facebook-both-companies-own-families-of-popular-social-networking-apps-used-by-billions-of-people-a-day-3