TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020 • Hacker News Board

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#131

Post by justicezyx » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:13 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #124

justicezyx wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are misled by the title... ByteDance's overwhelming revenue is from non-TikTok sources, i.e., all JinRiTouTIao, DouYin, and other minor properties. The title wants you to think it related to TikTok as it was one of the most controversial news pieces in 2020. TikTok's financial success is still very uncertain. ByteDance is facing a weak BIDU (note Alibaba do not have much Ads business, and Tencent has a different…

> TikTok's financial success is still very uncertain. I would take that bet any day of the week and twice on Fridays. TikTok has a massive, growing user base with engaging content on a platform that people generally like. I find it hard to believe they would succeed so massively in their app design and recommendation algorithms and then fail at monetization, which at this point is the trivial part. I don't know what…

BIDU is baidu's stock tick

For any spectacularly failed startup, there have been ardent supporters who uttered words no less enthusiasm than yours.

When I say their future are uncertain, I mean that it's more uncertain than one might expect, based on DouYin's success in China. One evidence I raised, is that competitors here are much stronger.

Plus, you might not believe it, CCP is more friendly to big tech than US government...

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#132

Post by graphpapa » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:19 PM UTC

justicezyx wrote: post #128

Spivak wrote: post #31

Honestly, good for them. TikTok is such a breath of fresh air in the social media space -- it's bursting with raw unfiltered creativity, interactions are really genuine and I've actually met now IRL friends on TikTok. Their recommendation engine is scary good at discovery which solves the "I don't know who to follow" problem, the ads are the least intrusive of any social media platform. If you don't "get" TikTok beca…

> raw unfiltered creativity LMAO Those videos are literally produced by color or facial enhancement *filters*... Not to mention the content moderation and censorship...

A figure of speech

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#133

Post by NathanKP » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:21 PM UTC

rapsey wrote: post #69

NathanKP wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Political content isn't banned, it just doesn't perform well with the audience on TikTok, which is generally younger and mostly less interested in politics. Usually when I see political content it is from someone dueting the original content to troll it, and the troll outperforms the original. People try to get their political content trending on TikTok, but it seems like it usually just gets parodied and they basica…

It is not just about audience. The political content is definitely de-emphasised and made harder to appear on peoples stream. It does not just happen by itself. It is moderated.

I really don't think it is as human curated as you think. A lot of political content is very low effort. For example boring political rants that regurgitate the same tired old political lines that we've already heard a million times before. This stuff doesn't last long on For You page because it doesn't have people watching it loop multiple times, and it doesn't get likes, so the algorithm deemphasizes it.

I have seen high effort political content hit the FYP page though and get millions of views. Like there is a guy who composes his own songs with a political theme and sings and dances them. That hits FYP all the time, because it is high effort and engaging, and people enjoy the tune and watch it loop a few times.

High effort political content does succeed and does hit FYP, but it is rare to see because most people haven't figured out how to do it right for the TikTok audience. The kind of tired old outrage memes that make it on Twitter won't succeed on TikTok because they don't generate the same algorithmic signals.

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#134

Post by madeofpalk » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:23 PM UTC

rapsey wrote: post #99

madeofpalk wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I love about tiktok is how they've managed to ban all political content. This is... not my experience with TikTok at all. I think what you've just described is your own little filter bubble that Tiktok presents. My Tiktok is very gay . Not that that is political, but I get a lot of trans rights content, queer issues/advocacy, BLM content, pro-choice content, "landlords are evil" content etc etc and usually its…

You say it is not your experience then you say you don't get political content.

Sorry for being unclear - I meant to say that just generally gay content is not political. Everything else I listed after I think is somewhat political (because politics is more than just saying “Republicans are bad!!!”)

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#135

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:26 PM UTC

est wrote: post #96

xvector wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't propaganda. I guess people say there is, because conspiracy theories are more fun than fact. But strong statements like "TikTok is propaganda" need to be supported with evidence. I would say that the highly tailored experience of the TikTok algorithm would make a propaganda op quite easy to detect. The algorithm is so ridiculously good, that you would instantly spot a propaganda video, or notice when your…

> There isn't propaganda There is. Tiktok China also got rid of all the political content because of the superior censorship algorithms.

[deleted]

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#136

Post by cruano » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:27 PM UTC

jensensbutton wrote: post #48

curiousllama wrote: post #35

The big difference between Tik Tok and everything else to me: when I stop scrolling, I feel _good_. On Instagram, I scroll until I hate myself. On Facebook, I used to scroll until I got frustrated. But on Tik Tok - it's a dopamine hit without the hangover.

You have no attachment to the content you see on Tik Tok. Facebook and Instagram are social network based. Tik Tok is not.

I'm also not attached to youtube and yet I never leave there happy either

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#137

Post by lucasverra » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:31 PM UTC

codetrotter wrote: post #98

hcarvalhoalves wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having people spend their attention span w/ "fun" content – as opposed to political / critical – seems perfect for a dystopian state.

Most so called political content is not useful anyways I don’t think. All I see for the most part is people convinced that their view is the right view, and almost no one seems to be trying to find common ground and work out solutions that everyone can be satisfied with. Instead it’s like they think that any inch you “give” is a loss.

https://polemix.io is a mobile platform that try to find common grounds by allowing "respect" votes that show that you disagree, but still find the idea/content/opinion relevant.

Social networks isolate people by only showing them content they agree with. It’s like french kissing yourself in the mirror.

We are 9 weeks online and growing with 2k+ users. Would appreciate your intake (invite code LV005). Cheers

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#138

Post by bmarquez » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:33 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #88

Spivak wrote: post #31

Honestly, good for them. TikTok is such a breath of fresh air in the social media space -- it's bursting with raw unfiltered creativity, interactions are really genuine and I've actually met now IRL friends on TikTok. Their recommendation engine is scary good at discovery which solves the "I don't know who to follow" problem, the ads are the least intrusive of any social media platform. If you don't "get" TikTok beca…

I guess I still just don't get it. I'm always shocked at glowing recommendations of TikTok...from HN of all places! Every time it comes up here, I take a few minutes to browse the site, to see if anything changed to justify the praise, and it hasn't. The content may be more lighthearted, but over half of the random feed on the home page I just browsed is fundamentally the same "camera in your own face" narcissism amp…

I used to have the same arguments against TikTok, too many narcissist attention-seeking influencers. But TikTok's algorithm shows you videos partly based on how much time you spend looking at a video.

So I started swiping to a new video immediately every time a selfie video showed up. The selfie videos mostly show up when you first create an account. The algorithm figured out I didn't like selfies so started showing me other random content, like travel, animals, etc. Then I started liking content I liked, so the algorithm gave me more of it.

I finally have what I like and don't see any "20 year-old zeros making videos about themselves", but it took some time to set up. It's refreshing, and much more pleasurable than Facebook or Instagram which tries to show me political shares when I'm actively unfollowing politics.

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#139

Post by yumaikas » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:34 PM UTC

hcarvalhoalves wrote: post #94

belval wrote: post #29

I hate TikTok because it's so good. It's a frictionless content pump that we can open and doom-scroll for hours. I have never seen such a beautifully crafted user experience, from the recommendation algorithm that is top-notch the content that is catchy and highlights trends without overdoing it and the absence of political content if you don't engage with it (or maybe there is none at all). I don't have it on my pho…

Having people spend their attention span w/ "fun" content – as opposed to political / critical – seems perfect for a dystopian state.

That's interesting, though. I find a lot of political and critical content on TikTok. You do have to look for it, it's not as popular, but TikTok definitely can be used for it.

Re: TikTok owner ByteDance sees its earnings double in 2020

#140

Post by tootie » Fri, Jun 18, 2021, 5:36 PM UTC

lorlou wrote: post #37

rapsey wrote: post #3

TikTok is a social network that could not be made by an American company, due to its complete disregard for free speech and embrace of censorship. This is a major part of its success, due to not allowing its network to deteriorate into culture wars and general unpleasant behaviour. I suspect any future social network much like TikTok will have exclusion as a major feature.

What I love about tiktok is how they've managed to ban all political content. It's a social network which is fun precisely because it's not monopolised by rotten people with loads of free time.

It's kinda unbelievable that there so much praise for their tightly controlled content and so much scorn for moderation done by Twitter or Reddit. It goes to show how much people's judgement is based on expectations and not absolutes.