An impending ban on TikTok in the United States is starting to sink in for content creators whose livelihoods rely on the popular video app.
The ban is expected to take effect on January 19, after the Supreme Court heard arguments on Friday on the move after months of debate. Congress has backed a ban due to privacy concerns with Chinese parent company ByteDance, while TikTok’s lawyers argue that a ban would violate users’ free speech rights.
Washington, DC wedding stylist Kati Kons, who posted about the ban on her TikTok handle @portraitofabbrideonfire, says she is in danger of losing her business.
“It really hit me where I was like, 90 percent of my business comes from TikTok. Ninety percent of my customers,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve had a single customer request from Instagram.”
Kons has been posting on TikTok for about a year to more than 23,000 followers about fashion and the politics of queer marriage, and she says it’s opened more doors than she ever thought possible.
She encouraged her TikTok followers to switch to her Snapchat and Bluesky accounts, with some success.
More recently, Kons urged people to boycott Meta platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Threads, as well as X, Google, YouTube and LinkedIn, to lobby in favor of the TikTok ban.
“I’d rather just see a consequence from them not listening to people,” he said.
On Friday, Supreme Court justices investigated the nature of TikTok’s speech rights and the government’s national security concerns. Joanne Molinaro, the full-time TikTok content creator from the United States, says that “TikTok alone seems arbitrary”, adding that the potential ban will “hit the bottom” of small businesses and creators.
She says the government pushing the ban is indicative of a “massive” disconnect between politicians and the American public.
This sentiment is shared by Nikita Redkar, a comedian based in Brooklyn, NY who has nearly 800,000 followers as @nikitadumptruck on TikTok.
She says content creators are angry.
“There is a cost of living crisis, there is a climate crisis, there are so many crises, but somehow the whole government of the United States came together to vote on this,” said Redkar. “It seems like a very obvious way to control the narrative.”
TikTok is expected to be removed from the app stores
Under the law, TikTok will be banned on January 19, unless ByteDance gives up the app, which it has not indicated it will do. If the ban goes into effect, the app is expected to be removed from the app stores, and its 170 million American users will no longer be able to receive updates for it. People can still keep it on their phones, but it will degrade over time without updates, and the company can choose to block its users from accessing it before that happens.
The president-elect of the United States, Donald Trump, has suggested that he is no longer in favor of the ban, however, opening the possibility of a revolution when he takes office on January 20.
Another Chinese short-form video app, RedNote – called Xiaohongshu in China – shot to the top of the Apple app store charts in the US, as some TikTok creators migrated there in anticipation of the ban.
Founded in 2013, Rednote has about 300 million active users, although some still worry, it could be banned in the United States for the same reason as TikTok.
Redkar, the comedian, started publishing on TikTok during the pandemic in 2021, and discovered an audience beyond what he was able to exploit in many years of doing stand-up comedy.
She has found a niche explaining the news in a comical and easy-to-understand format, tackling controversial topics as if she were broadcasting “high school drama” and gossip. Since then, Redkar has found a strong community of other political content creators, and earns money for branded deals on the platform.
She says the reality of the ban is just starting to sink in.
“It’s definitely scary. I don’t think I really understood what could happen, but now I’m kind of preparing for the reality of it,” he said. “I started talking to my audience about moving to other apps, and then just sharing my honest thoughts about it.”
Redkar is nervous that her political content isn’t playing as well on other platforms like Instagram Reels, and says she’ll also miss TikTok’s video editing features.
“It’s going to be messy”
“I think my income will be affected mainly if I’m only paid for advertising on Instagram,” he said. “Now, I’m going to rush and get on board some of these other apps, like YouTube, but then there’s going to be a huge influx of people going to YouTube …. It’s going to be messy for a little bit.”
Redkar hopes the ban will be stopped, giving creators more time to figure out their next moves or develop a new app that reflects TikTok’s “community” feel.
TikTok has not been banned in Canada, however was ordered to close its Canadian operations last year, and federal public servants I was unable to access it app on government phones from February 2023.
Content creators in Canada are also feeling the uncertainty, with American brand businesses and a large portion of their followers in the air.
Joey Pittari, a Toronto-based model who has 3.5 million TikTok followers with the handle @joewoahy, has been on the platform since its inception, and was previously on Musical.ly before merging with TikTok.
Pittari says he doesn’t know where his career would be if he hadn’t earned his social media following by doing comedy skits and lip-syncing videos.
“I think we’re still going to be affected (as Canadians) because a lot of our followers are based in America, and a lot of these brands are American,” he said.
Pittari says he’s trying to stay positive and hopes it won’t affect him too much. In the meantime, he plans to continue pushing content on other platforms and encouraging his followers to come.
“I mean, that’s all I can really do, right?”
https://i.cbc.ca/1.7377456.1731017943!/cumulusImage/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/16x9_1180/to-tiktok-office.jpg?im=Resize%3D620
2025-01-14 09:00:00
