Mark Zuckerberg made it clear that he doesn’t have high expectations from TikTok. However, we have some clarity now on the reason. In a nutshell, TiktoK has been growing like crazy, as compared to Facebook’s standards.
Some Stats
Reports state that TikTok was downloaded more than 738 million times, as per Sensor Tower, thus beating both Instagram and Facebook. Reports also state that TikTok is a big threat to Facebook’s dominance.
Earlier, Sensor Tower had written in a blog post that Tiktok’s 2019 installs represent around 44 percent of the 1.65 billion downloads that the app has led till date.
It continued to say that not everyone who downloads the app would become an active user. However, the numbers state that the story of an app experiencing meteoric growth, especially in China, where Facebook doesn’t have a market.
Why Is TikTok A Threat?
TikTok is known as Duoyin in China. ByteDance, Tiktok parent has the second largest market in the US, after China. All of this makes TikTok an existential threat to Facebook. Even as Facebook has sought a copy of some TiktTok features in its own apps, considerable efforts are yet to be seen.
Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook even failed had reportedly tried and failed to buy Musical.ly, prior to ByteDance’s 2017 acquisition of the app, that had later become TikTok.
Zuckerberg, however said that services like WhatsApp, are being used by protestors and activists everywhere due to strong encryption and privacy protections. However, the Chinese app is growing quickly around the world, where these protests are being censored, even in the US.
Lastly, it has come to notice that Zuckerberg’s paranoia of the Chinese government that he had once wooed is in good faith or not, however seeing TikTok grow faster than Facebook would probably sting for a while.
I love the comedy skits people make with the TikTok app. The recent one I enjoyed were the ones the jokes they made for Valentine’s day. The article has really gotten my interest. I am going to bookmark your blog and keep checking for new details every week. Many Thanks!