TikTok confirmed to Forbes that some of its American employees have the ability to boost video views in order to “introduce emerging celebrities and creators to the app community.”
The remarks come as part of a report on the "Heating" button on TikTok, which Forbes says can be used to place certain videos on users' For You pages, driving more views without going through the tab. The algorithm that supposedly presents the user with what they want to watch.
TikTok spokesman Jimmy Favazza told the site that increasing views for certain videos is not the only reason to use the "heat" button.
Favazza added that TikTok is "promoting some videos to help diversify and try out new content".
He explained that TikTok does not use this button much, claiming that "only 2% of the videos posted to the 4U pages are heated".
According to an internal document obtained by Forbes, it is reported that heated videos make up about 1-2% of total daily video views.
And the TikTok “heat” button makes content creators and brands feel naturally popular on the platform.
The heated videos do not come with a notification showing that they have been supported by TikTok such as ads or sponsored posts, according to the report, and instead these videos appear as any other clips that the algorithm chooses for you.
TikTok is not the only social media company that promotes videos abnormally (Reuters)
This news is not surprising, as there have been reports for years that the TikTok platform has promised to promote content to convince politicians and companies to use the platform, and companies - especially in the music industry - have not been afraid to use the platform to promote their brands.
And TikTok is not the only social media company that promotes videos abnormally, as several reports said that Facebook knew it was showing the number of views of some influencers and companies inflated and did not fix it immediately, in order to help attract advertisers and media companies to its platform. .
This case ended with Facebook paying $40 million to settle a lawsuit, although this is not quite the same scenario in the case of TikTok.
Content creators lose interest in the platform if their videos perform poorly compared to those being boosted, as TikTok's lack of transparency about the "heat up" button makes it difficult to identify which videos naturally made it to the top.
The report comes at a time when the TikTok application is facing intense competition from platforms such as YouTube, which recently began attracting content creators by giving them part of the advertising revenue generated from the shorts, and Instagram pays content creators for the “Reels” feature.