Video hosting YouTube announced the launch of the Shorts service, which is an analogue of the TikTok application. Its users will be able to share videos up to 15 seconds long, superimposing a musical sequence on them. Previously, the release of such a service was announced by Instagram, which introduced similar functionality in Stories. Why do IT giants copy TikTok – in the material of “Gazeta.Ru”.
The company also reminded that small videos created by the users themselves originated on YouTube – such, in particular, was the first video “Me at the zoo” uploaded to the platform, the duration of which is only 18 seconds. Now, with the advancement of smartphone technology, YouTube wants to create a form of content that can be easily created and downloaded from anywhere in the world. At the same time, users will be able to watch entertaining videos, even if they have only a few free minutes a day, since the format of short videos allows this.
In Shorts, users will be able to share videos up to 15 seconds long, combine them with videos of other authors, and also add music to them. It is easy to see that this functionality completely repeats the most popular application in the world, namely TikTok.
The Shorts beta test will take place in India , a country where TikTok and dozens of other apps of Chinese origin have been blocked due to tensions with the PRC . Thus, Indian users without TikTok will be able to create short music videos on a different platform.
In early August, Instagram, a Facebook corporation, also launched a TikTok clone, the Reels service, located in the Stories tab.
With Reels, users will also be able to record 15-second music videos or use already recorded material from other users.
Reels’ release coincided with alarming news about the fate of TikTok in the United States – President Donald Trump accused the application of spying for the PRC and promised to block the service if any American company does not buy it.
The release of TikTok-copying apps from the two largest companies in Silicon Valley – Google and Facebook – raises thoughts that IT giants have decided to seize the moment and turn to an already proven algorithm to launch their identical projects while TikTok is going through hard times. Moreover, if TikTok is indeed banned in the States, American users will have no choice but to switch to Shorts and Reels until the contradictions between the US and China are resolved.
However, there is another side to this situation.
The fact is that the format, which was first popularized on TikTok, can become a kind of content format of the future, which is gradually being adopted by all other social networks. This was the case, for example, with the Stories format, which originally formed the basis of the Snapchat application and is now an integral part of almost all major online platforms.
Tatiana Vinogradova, executive director of the iMARS communications group for Digital and SMM, told Gazeta.Ru that TikTok’s precarious position in the US and the incredible success of this platform around the world are two completely different stories.
According to her, creating high-quality content on YouTube, which will further rank well in the feed and gain a large number of views, takes a lot of time and effort. The new YouTube Shorts feature will make it much easier to interact with your audience.
The interlocutor of the publication recalled a similar story when Facebook tried to launch the Lasso application – a kind of alternative to TikTok. The project was unsuccessful and the company implemented an idea with similar goals on Instagram. However, even there, the reaction of the audience turned out to be ambiguous – perhaps because Instagram, unlike YouTube, was initially perceived as a service for publishing photos, the same Stories familiar to everyone, and not mainly video content. In Russia, a similar service – “Clips” – was recently introduced in “Vkontakte”.
“Today it is difficult to say whether the new service will be very popular. The test launch of the YouTube Shorts function, which, in my opinion, is intended only to expand the functionality of the formats in demand today, will take place in India. Nevertheless, it cannot be ruled out that it is in India, from which YouTube Shorts testing will begin, that the Chinese service and TikTok application are blocked. The logic of why testing begins in this particular region can be traced quite clearly. Giving people the opportunity to analogue where using the TikTok app is impossible is a rather serious step, showing not only the globalization of the service and the desire to follow popular trends, but also care for users whom the company wants to support in every possible way and leave the format for the continuation of creativity.
And although it is very difficult to compete in this segment with the largest short video exchange service TikTok and Instagram itself, it is necessary to look at the situation and the possibilities of the service after its launch.
If we do not see anything particularly unique, Shorts will hardly be able to compete in the battle for the attention of audiences, ”concluded Vinogradova.