TikTok creators and stars are banding together over criticism of the platform’s creator fund programs, revealing just how little they earn for the amount of effort they put in.
People can be very harsh on TikTok creators and users as a whole, calling their antics cringe-inducing and childish. While I completely expect this treatment from older generations, millennials joining in such bitter banter is sort of hypocritical and shows just how short our memories really are. We’re literally the generation that was called out for spending too much time on YouTube, our favorite stars were the Annoying Orange and FRED, and while we weren’t lip-synching to songs, anyone who can remember their emo-teen phase from back in the day should thank themselves for the emotional growth. My point is, there is absolutely no need to get all high and mighty over kids being kids, which is exactly what TikTok is. Accordingly, I expect very little sympathy to be directed towards TikTok creators, because of course the generation that was literally raised on YouTube stars would actively go and shun their next iteration. People across the internet are already very critical of creators on the platform, calling their work barely a job and all that sort of stuff.
However, that’s selling TikTok creators short. Sure, TikTok videos definitely don’t take as much active effort as YouTube videos do, with the latter requiring both much, much longer runtimes and a higher production value. However, TikTok creators accordingly have to upload content with more consistency and regularity, since both the algorithm and userbase will actively forget a creator if they don’t keep pumping out a decent amount of short-form videos; and even those videos still require a level of editing and production set-up. Most important of all is the fact that TikTok creators are a major driving force for the platform, actively raking in users and essentially being perhaps the single-most important contributor to the profits that higher-ups at the platform reap. Accordingly, it’s important that they be compensated in full.
However, creators are revealing that this is very much not the case. Funnily enough, the most comprehensive coverage of this current predicament comes from an individual who’s both a TikTok and a YouTube star: Hank Green of the vlogbrothers himself! His personal experience has him earning a dismal 2.5 cents per 1,000 views on the platform. This problem, according to Green, arises from TikTok refusing to grow its pool of money amongst an increasing number of creators on the platform. With fresh faces entering the field, this means that many users need to generate 40,000 views per day to even earn a dollar on the platform. Sure, earnings may be disproportionate, but a static pool means that if creators with bigger audiences earn more money, up-and-coming ones will literally have scraps to deal with.
TikTok has achieved massive success, and it’s nearly owed in its entirety to creators on the platform engaging with the short-form aspect of video-making. Cutting them out of the action is not only severely unethical, but it also spells future doom for the platform. If creators move out and set up shop elsewhere, with avenues such as Reels providing excellent alternatives, there’s not much TikTok will be able to do.
Read next: TikTok is working on some exciting features including avatars, live audio streams and many more
People can be very harsh on TikTok creators and users as a whole, calling their antics cringe-inducing and childish. While I completely expect this treatment from older generations, millennials joining in such bitter banter is sort of hypocritical and shows just how short our memories really are. We’re literally the generation that was called out for spending too much time on YouTube, our favorite stars were the Annoying Orange and FRED, and while we weren’t lip-synching to songs, anyone who can remember their emo-teen phase from back in the day should thank themselves for the emotional growth. My point is, there is absolutely no need to get all high and mighty over kids being kids, which is exactly what TikTok is. Accordingly, I expect very little sympathy to be directed towards TikTok creators, because of course the generation that was literally raised on YouTube stars would actively go and shun their next iteration. People across the internet are already very critical of creators on the platform, calling their work barely a job and all that sort of stuff.
However, that’s selling TikTok creators short. Sure, TikTok videos definitely don’t take as much active effort as YouTube videos do, with the latter requiring both much, much longer runtimes and a higher production value. However, TikTok creators accordingly have to upload content with more consistency and regularity, since both the algorithm and userbase will actively forget a creator if they don’t keep pumping out a decent amount of short-form videos; and even those videos still require a level of editing and production set-up. Most important of all is the fact that TikTok creators are a major driving force for the platform, actively raking in users and essentially being perhaps the single-most important contributor to the profits that higher-ups at the platform reap. Accordingly, it’s important that they be compensated in full.
Here’s mine, I’m 2 lazy to count the views on my tik toks but it’s prob over a billion views pic.twitter.com/D8cSrBdXsZ
— MrBeast (@MrBeast) January 21, 2022
However, creators are revealing that this is very much not the case. Funnily enough, the most comprehensive coverage of this current predicament comes from an individual who’s both a TikTok and a YouTube star: Hank Green of the vlogbrothers himself! His personal experience has him earning a dismal 2.5 cents per 1,000 views on the platform. This problem, according to Green, arises from TikTok refusing to grow its pool of money amongst an increasing number of creators on the platform. With fresh faces entering the field, this means that many users need to generate 40,000 views per day to even earn a dollar on the platform. Sure, earnings may be disproportionate, but a static pool means that if creators with bigger audiences earn more money, up-and-coming ones will literally have scraps to deal with.
TikTok has achieved massive success, and it’s nearly owed in its entirety to creators on the platform engaging with the short-form aspect of video-making. Cutting them out of the action is not only severely unethical, but it also spells future doom for the platform. If creators move out and set up shop elsewhere, with avenues such as Reels providing excellent alternatives, there’s not much TikTok will be able to do.
Read next: TikTok is working on some exciting features including avatars, live audio streams and many more