It’s been an emotional rollercoaster for TikTok creators over the past few months, with the app’s future uncertain. But there are ways to decompress.
TikTok creators in the United States have been on an emotional rollercoaster over the past few months. President Trump’s decision on Friday to extend the sale of the platform for another 75 days will likely keep those who depend on it for their livelihoods in a state of limbo for a while longer.
The thought of a TikTok ban in the U.S. under a federal law passed in April 2024 that stated the app would have to go unless its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, sold its U.S. operations brought on strong emotions among many creators back in January.
«It feels like I am losing a really good friend», creator Emily Senn said in a teary video posted on Jan. 15. «And that sucks.»
Then, after the platform went dark for a few hours on Jan. 18 when the ban took effect and then flickered back to life, the feelings of woe and fear transformed into widespread confusion and anger. Suddenly, the algorithms on the restored platform seemed different, and creators complained.
«This is not the same TikTok that we used to have», creator Lil Kombuchaa said in a Jan. 20 post.
(In a statement to NPR, TikTok said its policies and algorithms have not changed, but that users may have experienced «temporary instability» around TikTok features and access to the app as it worked to restore its U.S. operations in January.)
With U.S. companies such as Oracle and Amazon bidding over the platform this week and Trump’s decision to allow TikTok to keep operating despite Saturday’s deadline for its sale, the prevailing emotion among creators seems to be a despondent shrug of «Whateverness.
