Howard Students Take a Step Back from TikTok After its Brief Ban

(Courtesy/Alexander Shatov)

Late on Jan. 18, TikTok went dark on U.S. devices, leaving some Americans concerned, annoyed and confused. Others saw it as an opportunity to take a much-needed break from the app and focus on other things.

The U.S. government gave ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, until Jan. 19 to sell the company to an American buyer or face a shutdown.

When the app went offline, a message appeared: “A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”

The app was restored on the morning of Jan. 19, with a message thanking President Donald Trump for “his efforts” to find a solution for the ban.

More than 170 million Americans use TikTok for various reasons, integrating it into daily routines for entertainment, news consumption, and career development. After the brief shutdown, some users expressed frustration with their reliance on the app for their happiness.

“My plan is to consume a lot more long-form media. So, not necessarily YouTube, but like, movies, TV shows, and definitely more books and articles,”  Suma Sesay said, student at Howard University. 

“My screen time is very high, and I can see how this could be a good thing—helping me cut back and increase my attention span,” Sesay said.

Sesay was drawn to TikTok for its diverse content and accessibility to opinions on media and world topics.

“My For You page is tailored to my exact sense of humor and interests. It’s easy to gauge public opinion in real-time, which is super important,” she said.

Having used TikTok since 2018, Sesay said the app has been a consistent part of her life from her teen years into adulthood.

“The last five years that I spent on TikTok have been very transformative. I have a very niche set of interests that I wouldn’t have developed without TikTok,” she said. ,

According to Samba Recovery, an addiction treatment center in Atlanta, the average human attention span is 8.25 seconds. Many blame short-form content like TikTok and excessive phone use for the decline.

Me’Kayla Rothmiller, a Howard student and music artist, posts her rap music across platforms to boost engagement. She said going viral on TikTok made her feel like her reach was expanding and more people were listening to what she had to say.

She recognized the challenges of TikTok’s algorithm, saying it has allowed more people regardless of talent to “blow up” in the music industry because of its digestible and user-friendly nature—leaving room for mediocrity in the industry.

“If it’s catchy enough, people are going to like it and use it in all their videos. People don’t want to use more of their brains to grasp and understand what’s going on in a song. TikTok is for simplicity,” Rothmiller said.

She believes users will begin to move away from a quick-fix mindset, pushing artists like herself to work harder and present themselves more professionally on social media.

“Honestly, I love this for me. I feel like it’s put a fire under me. It’s going to make me hone in on my goals and what I really want to do,” Rothmiller said.

Although TikTok is still up and running for users who have not deleted the app, people are having trouble relying on it for information because it could go away again soon. 

“I’ve been reading more, online and like reading more books and articles,” said Howard student, Erin Brown. “I don’t like to get my information fully from an app…so I’ve been reading into actual credible sources.”