Three weeks ago, social media users woke up to the news of TikTok, a popular video-sharing app, being banned in the country. For the stars who rose to fame on the app, this was a huge blow to their lifestyle and future.
Prithivi Rajan and Thoufiq Mohamed
Chennai:
However, to fill the gap, social media applications have introduced features similar to that available on TikTok. City-based stars share whether the new features will assist their occupation.
Instagram recently launched Instagram Reel, a feature that allows users to shoot video and overlay it with music from the app’s library. Users can make 15-second videos and post it to their pages. Twitter also launched Fleets, a feature that allows users to take photos or videos and add text to it and is available publicly for only 24 hours.
While local stars say that Fleets are not usable due to the lack of an audio overlay and the fact that many videos on Twitter are easily buried due to huge traction on the website, Instagram Reel is an option that a few are exploring.
“The feature is similar to TikTok, and I feel it can be an adequate replacement to the app. Reels will be featured on the explore page, and users can scroll through the Reels and fine more videos by artists they like. The quality of the videos is good, too,” said Thoufiq Mohamed.
However, a few issues do persist – the short length of the videos, the lack of variety of filters and effects, and certain bugs and technical issues. However, Mohamed feels that these issues might be fixed in the long-term.
One of the biggest issues is the difference in the usage of various social media applications, said former TikTok user Prithivi Rajan. “Instagram is used for publishing pictures primarily. For videos, people go to YouTube. TikTok was used to see these quick, humorous videos. That feeling is not there in other applications, and so it will be difficult to replicate that in established social media apps,” he said.
Reintegrating followers from TikTok to other social media applications is another issue that users face. Rajan had a following of around 50,000 users in TikTok, but only has 700 followers on Instagram. Mohamed had 1.2 million followers on TikTok, but only around 53,600 users on Instagram. This drop in followers mirrors a drop in finances for the users, they said.
“Instagram is different from TikTok in the sense that only someone who is incredibly popular would have one million followers. Of my current following, around 10,000 recently followed me after the closure of TikTok,” said Mohamed. Rajan added that Instagram also is not as user-friendly in the navigation to view Reels from a user’s page.
Since the closure of TikTok, several clones such as Zynn were launched. However, as seen by the closure of Facebook’s TikTok clone Lasso on July 10, these applications are yet to replace the original.
“The new apps, much like TikTok in the early years, are working through the technical issues and user requests. It is difficult to go back to the initial days after being exposed to the smooth interface of TikTok, but we have to do this to continue my passion,” said Mohamed.