Today we are here to review What TikTok Music is. A lot of people think that it is threatening Spotify and Apple’s throne, and for a good reason.
We wouldn’t be surprised at all if TikTok released a music streaming app of its own given how closely music discovery feature is tied to the video platform. In fact, according to patent applications found by Insider, TikTok is already working on it.
What is TikTok Music?
The new platform enables musicians to post their music directly to TikTok, Resso, the music streaming service owned by parent company ByteDance, as well as to major international streaming services including Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, Deezer, and Tencent’s Joox.
The US Patent and Trademark Office received a trademark application for “TikTok Music” from TikTok’s parent firm, ByteDance, in May. The service would allegedly allow users to buy, play, share, and download music. Additionally, users would be able to make, share, and recommend playlists, leave comments on songs, and livestream audio and video. In Australia, ByteDance already submitted a trademark application for “TikTok Music” in November.
With streaming music, ByteDance has prior expertise. Resso, a music streaming app by ByteDance, was released in Indonesia, Brazil, and India in 2020. Some of the functions mentioned in the “TikTok Music” file are also present in Resso, including the ability to make playlists, share songs on social media, and engage with other users of the app.
Even now, ByteDance attracts current users from TikTok to Resso. The TikTok app in Brazil reportedly has a button that takes users to Resso so they may listen to the full version of a song they’re interested in, according to a report from The Information. This action aids in keeping users within the ByteDance ecosystem.
Resso had over 40 million monthly users as of November 2021 in Indonesia, Brazil, and India according to The Information. This number is expected to rise. Resso’s monthly active users increased by 304% between January 2021 and January 2022 in India alone, according to a research by Insider published earlier this year, compared to Spotify’s growth of 38% in the same nation.
It’s unclear if ByteDance intends to create a music streaming application using the Resso framework or if it will come up with something altogether different. A music streaming app with TikTok ties-ins may alter the music streaming market and force providers to shift, much like TikTok had a significant impact on how social media platforms function.
Why is TikTok Music threatening Spotify and Apple Music?
With a competitor to Spotify, Apple Music, and other music streaming services, TikTok with its steadily rising popularity, hopes to broaden its appeal even further. ByteDance submitted the invention in question to the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The TikTok Music service is the subject of the trademark.
We’re not only thinking TikTok music as a Spotify competitor because of the service’s name. Applications for smartphones and tablets that use the TikTok Music trademark include those that let users “to purchase, play, share, download music, songs, albums, lyrics, quotes, create, recommend, share his/her playlists, lyrics, quotes, take, edit and upload photographs as the cover of playlists, comment on music, songs, and albums.”
As you can see, it appears that TikTok will soon pose a threat to Spotify and other music streaming services. TikTok also attracts the attention of all the nearby young people and enjoys an insanely high level of popularity.
Additionally, the service may have included advertisements, suggesting that TikTok Music would feature a free tier that is supported by advertisements, similar to Spotify’s free tier. TikTok Music hasn’t been announced as of yet, and considering how patents work, it might never be. So bear that in mind.
With that in mind, it is highly likely that TikTok Music will come shortly.
Will TikTok Music face any difficulties from the US government?
TikTok Music, can encounter some difficulties though. You may have heard that there are some concerns among American lawmakers over TikTok, notably its parent company ByteDance, and its ties to China.
TikTok has been linked to China for years, according to rumors. TikTok was initially banned by former US President Donald Trump on the grounds that it posed a national security concern, but this ban was eventually lifted by President Joe Biden (in June last year).
However, US senators have recently expressed some worries about TikTok. More precisely, according to a Buzzfeed News investigation, TikTok’s Chinese-based developers have access to US user data. Later, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew acknowledged that some staff in China have access to US users’ information, including public videos and comments. He emphasized that no data is shared with the Chinese government, nevertheless.
The CEO of TikTok claims that ByteDance and his company have only a few links, and that the staff members’ access to the US clients’ data is not particularly sensitive.
We’ll have to wait and see how things turn out to determine whether TikTok will experience significant legal repercussions from the US authorities. If that happens, it will be challenging for the business to introduce TikTok Music while still attempting to be competitive in the US market. Since nothing about this is set in stone just yet, we’ll have to wait.
If TikTok Music does manage to launch, it may present a big challenge to Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube Music, and other music streaming services considering how TikTok has recently managed to take over the world.
If you are a TikTok user, you might want to learn how to use more than one filter on TikTok or what is TikTok Kia challenge and how to report it.
