Lawd help me, I’ve joined “the tiktok“. [1]Don’t you love when adults refer to something with a “the” in front of it? lolol I’ve actually been signed up for quite some time but I just never used it. I blame my co-worker. She kept sending me funny videos and I finally relented. I can see why the kids like it. It’s very free-form and easy to just pick up and use. And like many social media outlets, it is whatever you make it about: yourself, your life, your kids, LGBTI, politics, science, etc. It is all on there.
You can search for content; however, the more vids and people you like and follow, the more customized your feed becomes. You have basically two feeds. A wider open feed which filters from who all over and your “following” feed, which just shows vids from people you follow.
You watch a video, scroll to the next one. That’s about it for basic function. You can skip ahead or go back by swiping up and down. You can add friends, do “duets”, which is like a live reply feature, use filters, stickers, and add music tracks. It requires very little talent and it’s free. Once you start liking vids, you start getting a more ‘personalized’ feed, which is referred to as “for you”. This is the true magic of the app.
In simplest terms it is a huge time-suck! You start scrolling and before you know it an hour has gone by. When you get really deep you look up it’s 6pm and you started at noon. That is it’s single best and worst features rolled into one. lol It is utterly pointless on one hand and groundbreaking on the other. I can see why it is so addictive. And word is getting out because I routinely see older folks posting about how the kids are sending them hate-messages for being on ‘their app’.
In a weird way, it reminded me of an old movie called Brainstorm. Yes, I know unless you are close to my general age, you have no idea what it’s about…Wikipedia kiddies.
Anyway, I’m @mobiusSF. I don’t have much content. I’m still very much a ‘lurker’. (Honestly, I’m still deciding if I want to use it.)
References
| ↑1 | Don’t you love when adults refer to something with a “the” in front of it? lolol |
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