TikTok is the Chinese social media app which in less than a decade has risen to global dominance. It is a short-form-video-sharing app. India banned it in June 2020, when the armies of China and India came face to face. The USA took similar steps — ByteDance, the parent Chinese company was asked to divest from the company or be booted out of the US.

Before the ban India was the biggest market for TikTok. The US now is the biggest market — 143.7 million monthly users (January 2024).

While banning, India cited the data security and safeguarding privacy as the reason. The US also feels that it gives access to the data of Americans. The European union banned TikTok on the devices of its staff. Australia and Taiwan has taken similar steps. Pak bans it multiple times for indecent content. Nepal too bans it.

Though wholly or partly, TikTok is banned, it has not dented its relevance or popularity. Social media platforms have launched TikTok clones — Reels and Shorts from Facebook and YouTube respectively. Even LinkedIn is testing a short-form video platform. India has indigenous versions of TikTok — Josh, Chingari and Moj.

Social media platforms have also adopted vertical video feature, with scrollable feed — for instance the Discovery feed. Instagram YouTube and Netflix too experiment with the vertically shot scrollable short-form video feature. Thus, it is TikTokisation of the social media.

What matters is that TikTok resonates with the users. Though TikTok is a late entrant, it could garner 1.5 billion monthly active users (2023 end). It remains dominant in both tech and non-tech space.