The general public is surely no stranger to the hit social media app, TikTok. The app is awaiting the Supreme Court’s imminent ban on Sunday.
Despite the major success of the entertainment app, TikTok is owned by a Chinese company known as ByteDance. This company has been deemed by the U.S. government as a form of spyware and violates user’s privacy while scrolling on TikTok, resulting in an upcoming ban.
At the time of writing, it is not 100% for sure getting banned, but all signs point towards it. With all the turmoil in the air about this event, from someone who used to use TikTok every hour of the day, here are both sides of the spectrum regarding the ban.
Let’s begin with the pros, similar to a prior article, there are many negative effects social media has on mental health. People tend to spend an unhealthy amount of time on their phones daily. Even after asking close friends of mine, most of that screentime racks up from TikTok.
With TikTok gone, it will help people stay away from their phones for extended periods of time.
If TikTok does get banned, another pro to this is that people’s attention spans will inevitably get longer. With the rapid fire quick information videos that TikTok provides, users will swipe away almost immediately if the video doesn’t reel them in. Longer attention spans can help better education and patience in many departments of life.
As for cons, the first is businesses that have become successful because of TikTok and their grand success during the pandemic. One of the most popular businesses that has thrived due to TikTok is Enchanted Scrunch. The company took off after a video posted in 2020 showcased the unique design of their scrunchies.
This viral video made their company explode in popularity and sales. They amassed around 170,000 followers, started making six figures in their sales and their sales percentage shot up 90%.
Of course there are other apps similar to TikTok that can take over, the first that comes to mind is Instagram Reels. But switching from one app to another in this scenario isn’t anywhere as easy as it sounds. If TikTok does get banned, businesses will either struggle or just entirely get put out of business, years of hard work and dedication all down the drain.
The second and final con to a TikTok ban is relatively similar to businesses failing. People use TikTok to promote their brands and even Twitch or Youtube channels. A ban would significantly affect small up and coming creators that want to do this as their job. With the continuous growth of short form content, creators are using this as an advantage to share their funny clips and to get themselves out there.
With the popularity of TikTok and with over 1.5 billion users, the app is borderline perfect to help promote businesses. Without TikTok, there wouldn’t be a huge platform to really help promote their channels.
Small creators can also post on Instagram or even YouTube shorts. But if TikTok gets banned, there are billions of people who will most likely never see small creators that can easily take off due to the popularity of the app.
So, while the actual final decision is still up in the air, there for sure are good sides and bad sides of TikTok getting banned from the app store in America.
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