Throughout my inaugural plunge into TikTok, in 2019, I wished to throw my telephone right into a volcano. It wasn’t that I hated what I noticed—fairly the alternative. Inside a few hours of swiping and “hearting,” TikTok knew extra about exactly what my 40-year-old mind discovered amusing than some mates who had identified me for years. The algorithm was eerily correct, and I didn’t need to reward it with time and a spotlight. It needed to go.
It was unsurprising within the years since to see TikTok’s recognition explode to the extent of a billion-plus global users. What was stunning, nevertheless, is how lots of the app’s followers are actually utilizing it not only for animal movies and Beyoncé drops however to eat information. In accordance with the Pew Analysis Heart, a growing number of U.S. adults who use TikTok say they get at the very least a few of their information from it—up from 3% in 2020 to 14% in late 2023. As a voracious information reader and TikTok teetotaler, I needed to know: What sort of information had been they really getting?
To be able to discover out, I spent every week getting my information solely from TikTok.
Protecting all breaking information from discovering me every other means can be practically not possible with out the help of a sensory deprivation tank, however I did my finest. All subscribed newsletters would go unread, all present events-related podcasts would keep unplayed, and I’d go on different social media solely to share issues like the spanakopita pasta I efficiently cooked one evening. I additionally abstained from watching cable information, however like a growing number of Americans I already do this on a regular basis anyway.
With a weeklong restrict to the experiment, I didn’t have sufficient time to see how information protection would organically seep into my TikTok consumption. There must be some reverse-engineering. I went to the Society tab of the Discover web page and began clicking on something even vaguely resembling information or commentary. I adopted each news-spewing TikToker I might discover—skilled reporters like Taylor Lorenz and pure web personalities like ImNotaLawyerBut—together with a few of the accounts these accounts had been following. I made positive to observe posts from throughout the political spectrum.
One of many first issues I seen after I began spending loads of time on TikTok was the staggering increase in advertising on the app, and the best way these advertisements mimicked the type, tone, and vocab of the movies that aired in between them. (“Ship this to somebody with rizz,” a cursed missive from Kellogg’s cereal recommended.)
It didn’t take lengthy earlier than my For You web page was overflowing with every kind of topical content material. I rapidly found that there are two primary types of information content material on TikTok—video clips or screenshots that customers repurpose from precise information sources, and folks describing or explaining information gadgets, with a aspect air of opinion. I realized that Russian opposition chief Alexei Navalny died from a still image on an account known as Russian American Each day, providing no additional data. I realized that Pedro Pascal and Vanessa Kirby had been solid within the upcoming Incredible 4 reboot from a man complaining concerning the pair’s age hole.
Between the 2 types of Newsy TikTok, I started to expertise the Twitter impact of discovering out the information whereas concurrently discovering out what individuals are saying concerning the information.
My important subject with the primary type—easy repurposed media—was that it was typically troublesome to inform when it initially surfaced. I noticed a snippet of CNN’s Abby Phillips urgent Florida Consultant Matt Gaetz about President Joe Biden’s potential impeachment, uncertain if it was from the earlier week or five months earlier (it turned out to be the latter). I wasn’t positive what to really feel about Senator Bernie Sanders’s ideas on Gaza, as a result of I had no concept when he expressed them on this explicit clip. The quickest means I discovered to discern when a Tiktok was launched is to test the feedback, that are time-stamped, and even that may be unreliable. Time isn’t a flat circle on Newsy TikTok—it’s a Las Vegas on line casino with no clocks or home windows in sight.
The opposite dominant type of information content material on the platform—the explainer—normally consists of an individual inexperienced screened in entrance of a blown-up picture of whichever information merchandise they’re speaking about. A few of these information gadgets are mercifully dated, which helps. (Fast Company’s TikTok, for what it’s value, typically makes use of this format, with the dates clearly seen above the headline.) The extra compelling of those TikTokers hit viewers with their important level instantly, and seem to edit their commentary with a zero-attention-span viewers in thoughts.
Many different movies, although, are bloated and ponderous and underline the issues with consuming information this fashion. In contrast to a modest-size article or a 280-character tweet, you possibly can’t skim a boring TikTok to get to the purpose.
Fairly quickly, I used to be seeing contradictory takeaways from totally different sources about the identical newsworthy video clips, which made it troublesome to inform precisely what occurred. Getting both-sides protection of one thing like Donald Trump presenting gilded-flag footwear at Sneakercon is type of enjoyable, as a result of I don’t want goofy liberal jokes about “Treason 45s” and “January 6’s” or fawning reward of them to make my very own judgment. (The footwear are horrible, and paying $400 for them is preposterous.)
On the subject of a narrative with a extra ambiguous end result, although, like the hearing to find out whether or not Georgia District Legal professional Fani Willis engaged in misconduct in her case in opposition to Trump, the commentary on either side is actively unhelpful. One TikToker says Willis has been “completely eliminated” from the case whereas one other salutes her “epic clapbacks,” and they’re each speaking about the identical footage.
Apparently, TikTok additionally surfaces movies from Fox Information and MSNBC anchors speaking concerning the listening to, and it’s equally vapid.
Close to the tip of this experiment, I grew to become determined for easy, dependable data—the type that comes with simply checkable sources. Whereas some TikTokers over the course of the week pointed me towards tales I might not otherwise have seen and others helpfully provided their lived experience as context, a lot of them had been clearly angling for virality with hypercharged rhetoric and different information.
Like each different social media platform, TikTok has a large misinformation downside. Is an assault on American soil imminent and can it result in World Struggle III? Did the decide within the E. Jean Carroll civil defamation trial take a $5 million bribe to convict Trump? In accordance with some TikToks I noticed, sure on each counts. Anyone can inexperienced display screen themselves in entrance of a information headline and say something they need concerning the supposed contents of an article, and it’s as much as viewers to resolve whether or not they’re simply making stuff up.
As soon as the week was over, I eagerly devoured all my normal newsletters and topical podcasts to see what I’d missed. It was far lower than I’d imagined. Britain and Japan had slipped right into a recession, Nike and Cisco and a bunch of different firms had been slicing tons of of jobs, and Open AI unveiled a demo of its terrifyingly on-point text-to-video mannequin, Sora. I missed loads of specifics about what is going on in Gaza and the indictment of Alexander Smirnov for feeding false details about the Bidens to the FBI, however the large image was pretty intact.
Unimaginable as the thought appeared only a week earlier, anybody with a wholesome degree of media literacy can safely complement their information eating regimen with TikTok. It’s an inefficient solution to get sure data—I realized extra about what occurred within the Fani Willis listening to in actually one sentence of a Semafor publication than I had all week—however hopefully not too many individuals try to get all their information from TikTok.
Whereas I completed this unusual experiment with a extra optimistic notion of TikTok’s newsiness, one thing concerning the platform saved nagging at me. It wasn’t simply the earwormy audio cues both. It was the best way so many information commenters opened their movies with traces straight out of a late-night speak present monologue. “Did you hear about this?” “Let me get this straight.” The desperation to hook viewers in for a complete video preys on these viewers’ desperation to remain on top of things with what they think about “everyone else” is having fun with proper now.
The extra I considered it, the extra I spotted that information on TikTok too typically felt like all the pieces else on the platform, particularly the folks and types promoting stuff. “You’ve most likely been listening to about the advantages of magnesium throughout TikTok.” In the identical means I felt intoxicatingly included by witnessing the Glee meme coalesce in actual time, I additionally discovered myself desirous to sop up whichever juicy tidbits Newsy TikTok appeared most desirous to expose. Very like the algorithm itself, creators serve up solely what viewers have a tendency to reply to, in the best way that the majority reliably prompts a response. And in terms of information, what we apparently most reply to is the promise of discovering out what we think about “everybody else” already is aware of.
