Scientists believe everyone has 6 doppelgängers somewhere in the world, right? Is YouTube Shorts, TikTok’s double? Is it healthy competition, or is it a case of YouTube wanting in on a good thing?
What are they?
TikTok
TikTok is an app that has taken the world by storm. Most popular with teenagers and young adults, people share 15 seconds worth of themselves dancing, singing or talking to the camera. There seems to be a new trend each week, whether that be sharing an embarrassing story that relates to a certain theme or bringing back old tunes and following a set dance routine. It’s all just a bit of fun, but people seem hooked.
Originally, creators started out with Musical.ly in 2014. People would create short videos of themselves lip-syncing to well known songs and post them for others to view. It became fairly popular, but then the hype for it started to dwindle, and the creators decided to move in a different direction. They passed their creation over to the company ByteDance, who decided to combine Musical.ly with their not yet polished app TikTok. Hence, the birth of the app we all know today.
People missed Vine. Remember that app? Where everyone would share just 6 second clips! How did we fit anything into such a short time? The loss of this created a great gap in the market for TikTok to take over – and boy has it!
Hashtags are key within this app. They’re the first thing you see when you head to the discover page. The ones featured there are the current trends. This is what TikTok stars use to stay relevant. You’ll also find songs that are trending there. There may be a specific dance created to match a track, and everyone will use this app to recreate their own version.
YouTube Shorts
YouTube Shorts is a new concept created by the YouTube team where people can create short videos from their phones without needing lots of technical equipment. They advertise it as a platform where people can promote themselves in 15 seconds or less. People can get on board with the latest trends and recreate videos with their own spin on it.
It’s limited beta version was first released within India, before being rolled out to the US and UK. You’ll find YouTube Shorts within the main YouTube app rather than it being its own separate thing. Seems quite handy, having everything in one place? You have the option to like or dislike each video as you would within a normal YouTube video. You’re able to share or comment on the short, and all audio will be displayed within the clip, so you can find the original.
Any clip under 60 seconds will be added to their shorts feature. This is a great way of video creators mixing it up and including both full length vlog style and also the short, snappy but catchy content.
Comparisons
Both platforms seem pretty similar, they both feature 15-second long videos, and they both encourage trending topics. Is there room for both of them, or will one of them over-throw the other?
YouTube appear to have taken inspiration from the much loved TikTok app. Maybe they’ll both cater to different types of people. TikTok may be pushed more towards people who just enjoy making short videos and copying dance routines, with the aim to go viral or simply have a bit of fun. Maybe YouTube’s target market is content creators that already use their main channel. The YouTubers of this generation.
I guess YouTube Shorts just haven’t been in the game for long enough to see which direction they’ll head in. It will be interesting to watch both platforms grow and maybe even battle it out for the top spot.
