In today’s episode, we cover the new social media platform Tik-Tok, and discuss its quality, similarity to other apps and staying power.
Jarek: Hello everybody, my name is Jarek Harris and I‘m here with—
Dean: Dean Hunter—
Jarek: And you are tuning into the Pirate’s Podcast. Today we will be going over Tik Tok, the new sensation—
Dean: –Meme, music, platform thing. We should probably introduce Tik Tok before we talk about some opinions. So, um, Jarek, you wanna talk about what Tik Tok is?
Jarek: So basically, what Tik Tok is, it’s a new platform where people post their “memes” um, their “funny memes.” You know, it’s grabbed the attention of a lot of younger people now a days.
Dean: Yeah and I think that’s an interesting way to start a podcast. Is it a um, music app? Is it a meme app? Or is it both?
Jarek: I’m not gonna say it’s exactly one or the other.
Dean: Yeah, I think it’s fair to say it’s both. I mean, you can find a lot of people posting music videos on their, but you also find a lot of memes on there. You can find a little bit of both. I think a way to think about the app, for people who haven’t used it, Musical.ly and Vine merged into one platform.
Jarek: True.
Dean: I think that’s a way to think about it.
Jarek: I feel like it’s been giving a lot of artists the exposure they either needed or desired for a while now.
Dean: Is lip-syncing a talent? Cause with Tik Tok, you can do a lot of original videos, but also a lot of it is lip-syncing with videos.
Jarek: Well before Tik Tok was a thing, Musical.ly as we discussed earlier or whatever, that was their thing, a whole bunch of lip-syncing. I feel like Tik Tok kinda moved away from that.
Dean: Tik Tok is more about the cinematography. Anyone can lip-sync a meme, but with Tik Tok, you have to be more creative to succeed on that platform.You have to come up with a way to convey your meme. I don’t know if that makes any sense. You have to come up with a way to convey the joke.
Jarek: Yeah. I feel like the actions of the people and the music link together.
Dean: There’s a very interesting comparison between Tik Tok and Vine. They’re very similar platforms. Tik Tok, if I’m correct, came out around the same time Vine “died” right? Vine died in 2016. Tik Tok was popularized, what, two years later? I guess in that time the metaphorical void was filled by Musical.ly.
Jarek: It was just there for the cringe–
Dean: –Musical.ly was there to make fun of. You could just make fun of all the kids on the platform, but Tik Tok, I guess it’s kinda embraced the meme.
Jarek: Tik Tok started off with your cringy little kids.
Dean: Yeah, Tik Tok started off as a bootleg Musical.ly, but I think it’s such a successful platform because it embraced the meme and using the cinematography to make funny things.
Jarek: That’s what I think. On Tik Tok at first, you’d see cringy teens doing dance videos or whatever and now it’s like, oh okay, what funny thing am I going to find today?
Dean: I can’t say I’ve actually used the platform, but from what I’ve seen, it’s definitely a lot more meme than music. There are still people who do music, but I think the people who are doing music are aware that they’re going to be clowned on by other users. I think some of the best Tik Toks are making fun of the people who are on there for, I guess, serious reasons. I think that’s really interesting, that a large portion of the funny things from the platform, is from making fun of other people on the platform.
Jarek: That’s one thing I kinda wanna transition into, as the years progress, how long do we expect Tik Tok to be around?
Dean: Vine lasted what, two, three years?
Jarek: A solid three.
Dean: Musical.ly lasted two, two and a half if you’re being generous. Tik Tok is like an amalgamation of both. So I think we could probably see a longer shelf life. I don’t know if it’s going to last forever.
Jarek: I don’t see it lasting forever, no no.
Dean: I mean you can do so much with Tik Tok, that you can’t do with other platforms.
Jarek; I do see that. As the years progress, I feel that everything is going to be already done. There’s not going to be much left to be created.
Dean: yeah. You can make the argument that memes are gonna die eventually because there’s a finite number of memes can be made, but I think that Tik Tok is going to last longer. I don’t think it’s going to last nearly as long as a larger platform like YouTube or Instagram. I mean because they have become social media icons. I think it’s made its name as one of the minor players.
Jarek: It’s a very honorable mention.
Dean: Yeah, it’s an honorable mention. That’s a good way to put it. When you’re thinking of big social media companies, you think of YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, but at the back of your mind it’s always gonna be Tik Tok because there’s a good amount of stuff that comes from there.
Jarek; Yeah, yeah. We still get good content
Dean: There’s still good content coming from the app. I say it’ll be around for another eight years.
Jarek: Eight years? I say about a good five.
Dean: I will say it’ll last longer than five years because there’s gonna be kids who are gonna want to get on it. A lot of the users are our age and a lot of their siblings are in middle and elementary and they’re gonna wanna do because they’ve seen their older brothers and sisters doing it. I think that’s what’ll eventually kill the app. The younger brothers and sisters are going to get on it and not know how to do it.
Jarek: Yeah, I do think that’s what’s gonna kill it.
Dean: This has been the Pirate’s Hook podcast, thanks for listening.
