Zizi Sparks: TikTok not the black hole people say it is

Some people find themselves spending hours on the app. Photo / Getty Images

OPINION

I caved. I'd been stubborn for so long. I'd seen friends fall down the rabbit hole and decided "na, it's not for me". But about a week ago I did a u-turn.

I downloaded TikTok.

It's not like I'd never seen a TikTok before. Friends would send links to them, I'd click, they'd open in a web browser, I'd watch, and then it would prompt me to download the app for more. No thank you I'd think.

Friends had told me how much of a black hole TikTok was, how they'd lose track of time scrolling through the short videos. I didn't want to risk the same fate.

Instead, I stuck to Instagram which has both photos and short clips (reels) not unlike TikTok clips.

But recently I've become sick of Instagram so I thought, why not dive in and download TikTok.

TikTok is a video-sharing social media app. It launched worldwide in late 2018 but really took off in 2020-21 during the global pandemic.

Global decision intelligence company Morning Consult ranked TikTok as the third fastest-growing brand of 2020 and in September last year, TikTok reported it had reached one billion users.

Many believe its rise was driven by global lockdowns as people had more time to view and create content.

Data from Cloudflare, a web security and performance company, late last year showed TikTok was 2021's most popular website, surpassing Google.

The platform is so popular some people even make money from it.

It is huge. So I decided to download TikTok. Knowing already how some people let their use get away from them, I used the digital wellbeing feature on my phone to set an app timer. This means I can use TikTok for a maximum of one hour a day before it locks me out.

This is more than enough on the days I work and makes me mindful of my use on a weekend.

In the first week of having the app, I averaged 37 minutes of use per day with my use ranging from 16 minutes to 56. That's decreased since then.

Many of those minutes brought a smile to my face. There are animal clips, funny clips, comedians, talk show clips and more. Contrary to popular belief it is more than just people posting videos of themselves dancing to audio clips.

Some of the people I follow on Instagram also post on TikTok so I crossed over. If you follow the right people, you'll have plenty of luck finding wholesome content.

For now, I'm enjoying discovering TikTok and being mindful of my use of it.

Social media isn't all bad, as long as you're mindful of your use and the time spent on it.