This time last year, many social media users were holding mock funerals for TikTok—the popular app where 15-second clips could be either the ultimate time waster, something to help doomscroll, a gateway to new music or an avenue for some to change their lives—prior to the platform going offline in the U.S. temporarily.
With TikTok separated from its original parent company (ByteDance) in the U.S., the nationwide version of the app is now owned by the same brain trust behind Oracle, Paramount+, CBS and so on. The new parent company made swift changes to the app’s terms of service. When users attempted to prove that censorship rules on the app had changed, they noticed that videos about ICE were being limited and “Epstein” is now a blocked term in direct messages.
App owners suggested the issue was due to a power outage, but users still argue their voices and videos were being knocked down as of Monday (Jan. 26).
The app’s U.S. acquisition prompted several users to quit the platform outright and switch to a new app called UpScrolled.
But for activists like Jamira Burley, TikTok feels like “a trap door” where she doesn’t feel her “work or safety is protected.”
“When tech giants, wealthy investors, and political pressure start making the rules, you already know whose voices are silenced first,” Burley wrote on her Substack. “Spoiler alert: it’s not the ones with power. It’s the people using their voices to name harm, imagine better systems, and challenge the world to do better.”
Burley specified that those most affected by TikTok’s new Terms of Service would be “Black folks. Queer folks. Disabled folks. Poor folks. Truth-tellers. Organizers. Artists.”
Her message echoes that of several creatives and users who’ve left the app in recent days: “Our communities are bigger than any one app,” she wrote. “We can bring that magic somewhere else. Somewhere slower, more intentional, and built on care instead of clout.”
