The past week has been a roller-coaster ride for TikTok users in America. With speculations regarding the potential divestiture, the official ban coming into effect, and the ray of hope given to users regarding the possible reinstatement of the platform, users have been left confused with the contrary decisions being heard about the future of the app. However, one man's loss is another man's gain seems to stand true, as benefiting from the growing uncertainty, Bluesky and X found the opportunity to introduce their new video feeds to allow users to watch vertical videos.
While TikTok is working towards being back online, Bluesky and X see an opportunity window to bring ahead their vertical video feed
TikTok ban has garnered quite the attention with the 170 million American user base, stirring quite the discussion over its ban, with young users even calling up 911 to express their distraught. After Trump's assurance to TikTok, the platform let users know that it is working to get it back online. However, the ambiguity regarding its future has still left many feeling dismayed. Seeing the gap and the opportunity window amid the ongoing situation, BlueSky and X, both social media platforms, have capitalized on the uncertainty by unveiling new features to expand their video ecosystem and fulfill user demand for short video content.
The social media platforms have introduced new tabs and feeds for video content to make it easier for users to view vertical videos and bring forward a similar experience as TikTok. Instagram jumped on the competitive train as well by launching CapCut's rival 'Edits,' when the TikTok-owned video editing app went offline in the U.S.
Bluesky seems to be aggressively working towards establishing itself in the video content space by launching customizable feeds for videos specifically. It would mimic the browsing experience of TikTok by allowing users to swipe up or down video feeds. A novel element added to the feeds is its ability to fetch videos from selected hashtags and build targeted feeds from them. To emphasize its customization capabilities, Bluesky expressed in its announcement post:
Like any other feed, you can choose to pin these or not. Bluesky is yours to customize.
Bluesky's latest update offers a dedicated video feed within the search tab, and users can see a timeline of trending videos on the platform seamlessly. The platform seems to be heavily inspired by TikTok, and by introducing these features, it is building on the popularity of short-video content. Bluesky emphasizes that the swipe-to-navigate feature for video-only timelines is available exclusively for custom feeds. Whether TikTok is able to get back in the U.S. or not is yet to be seen, but it does have a growing competition lined up.
