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President Joe Biden<\/span> signed a bill on Wednesday that could ban TikTok<\/a> \u2013 for real this time. After so many false starts and stops, some creator economy founders and their clients are rolling their eyes. They\u2019ve been through this before.<\/p>\n \u201cI think two years ago, this would have been devastating,\u201d Karat Financial<\/a> co-founder and co-CEO Eric Wei told TechCrunch. \u201cNow\u2026 Eh.\u201d<\/p>\n When creators succeed, the startups that work in the creator economy generally succeed as well. Still, Wei isn\u2019t particularly concerned that the friction from a TikTok ban would impact his business, a Series B startup that provides financial services to creators.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you build products in startups that help creators make money, then actually, from an addressable market point of view, this is good for you,\u201d Wei said. \u201cYour framing can be like, \u2018TikTok is gone, as a creator, you need to be thinking about diversifying and how to support yourself, so here\u2019s XYZ things you can do.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The threat of the TikTok ban feels a bit like \u201cThe Boy Who Cried Wolf,\u201d even though this time, it\u2019s different. This isn\u2019t just political theater<\/a> in the form of ongoing Senate hearings. This bill, which would force ByteDance to sell TikTok if it can\u2019t find an American buyer within nine months, made its way through the House and the Senate to Biden\u2019s desk, where he signed it into law.<\/p>\n But the creator landscape looks different now than it did in 2020, when former President Donald Trump tried banning<\/a> the Chinese-owned app (and, as he runs for president again, he now says he\u2019s opposed to the ban, because it would give Meta too much power). Established creators have had about three years of legal back-and-forth and two different presidencies to prepare their businesses for a world without TikTok.<\/p>\n As Wei scrolls through a large group chat he\u2019s in with other creators, he notes that no one\u2019s too panicked.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m looking through, and there\u2019s some jokes \u2013 one guy jokes, \u2018My Snapchat shares are about to pop,\u2019 and another said, \u2018Let\u2019s make a skit: when TikTokers protest the TikTok ban \u2013 who\u2019s in?\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cA third says, \u2018TikTok\u2019s about to sue, I\u2019ve been talking with their internals,\u2019 and a fourth one replied, \u2018Where\u2019s my popcorn?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t the case for all kinds of creators. Wei notes that TikTok livestreamers and creators that monetize via TikTok Shop could be hit the hardest, since platforms like YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels aren\u2019t as invested in those features as TikTok. The ban could also be detrimental to politically-oriented creators<\/a>, since Instagram Reels isn\u2019t a viable alternative for them \u2013 the Meta-owned platform has begun limiting<\/a> the reach of political content. And while the more established creators in Wei\u2019s group chat have been preparing for this for years, the transition away from TikTok could be a huge gut-punch to newer creators who don\u2019t have followings on multiple platforms yet.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be clear, no one\u2019s like, \u2018This is good for us!\u201d Wei said. But the amount of time creators have had to prepare for this moment has made them better poised to weather the storm.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is something that\u2019s been talked about for a very long time, so creators are aware \u2013 this is not new,\u201d Harry Gestetner, co-founder and CEO of creator monetization platform Fanfix<\/a>, told TechCrunch. \u201cThe second thing is, this is not an overnight ban. Creators still have about a year to transfer their following, so I am optimistic.\u201d<\/p>\n James Jones \u2013 the CEO of Bump<\/a>, another financial services company for creators \u2013 is looking at the situation in parallel.<\/p>\n \u201cThere will undoubtedly be a ripple effect amongst the creator community as a result of the TikTok ban,\u201d Jones told TechCrunch. \u201cBut creators are getting better at diversifying the ways that they monetize across multiple platforms. We\u2019ve also seen this movie before in the case of Vine, which paved the way for TikTok to fill the void that it left.\u201d<\/p>\n TikTok\u2019s secret sauce is its power to help creators get discovered \u2013 more so than other platforms, anyone can blow up on the For You Page. But while Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts could have been likened to \u201cKirkland brand<\/a> TikTok\u201d in 2021, the platforms have since matured.<\/p>\n In TikTok\u2019s initial Creator Fund<\/a>, a static pool of money distributed among a growing number of eligible creators, few people were supporting themselves on TikTok views alone. This has only recently changed as TikTok transitioned creators into its Creativity Program<\/a>, which offers a better deal to eligible creators \u2013 but not all creators are making videos that fit the bill for that program. So, to make content creation a stable career, they\u2019d have to transition onto other platforms anyway. YouTube Shorts has started sharing ad revenue<\/a> on short-form videos, similar to its longstanding Partner Program, while Instagram Reels only has occasional, unreliable bonus programs<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gestetner told TechCrunch that some creators he works with have been disillusioned by TikTok anyway.<\/p>\n \u201cThe problems with TikTok go past just the ban,\u201d he said. \u201cCreators so often get their accounts removed on TikTok, or get shadow banned, or get reported, and it\u2019s very difficult to get an answer from TikTok. So we\u2019ve dealt with problems there for years now.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s not as though other platforms don\u2019t share these transparency issues. But these risks have made it essential for creators to not put all their energy into one platform.<\/p>\n \u201cFive years ago, creators were generally on one platform,\u201d he said. \u201cNow, every creator has a minimum of three, and up to five, six or seven platforms they use.\u201d<\/p>\n This necessity of diversification extends beyond just the platforms creators use. Creators also need to generate income from a variety of sources, whether that be through fan memberships, product sales, live performances or courses.<\/p>\n \u201cI think on our business, there will be no impact, or potentially kind of a positive impact,\u201d Gestetner said. \u201cIt helps our case, because creators are all skeptical of the big platforms, and they don\u2019t want all of their monetization to be tied to a particular platform.\u201d<\/p>\n In theory, the ban on TikTok could create room in the market for another short-form video app \u2013 perhaps one that is not owned by a massive corporation like Meta or Google. But this likely won\u2019t pose another situation like what happened when Elon Musk bought Twitter, and several microblogging apps cropped up seemingly overnight.<\/p>\n \u201cI think a really good example of this is like, remember Triller?\u201d Wei said. \u201cFor a while, we were all excited about it, like \u2018Oh my god, TikTok\u2019s going away, let\u2019s put money toward Triller!\u2019 But then everyone realized TikTok is not going away. And now it\u2019s years later, and does anyone talk about Triller anymore?\u201d<\/p>\n Well, they might not be talking about Triller either because the company is a walking<\/a> red<\/a> flag<\/a>. In any case, creators won\u2019t have the patience to invest in a nascent platform that might not last, so they\u2019ll have to make due with Instagram, YouTube and Snapchat. That doesn\u2019t mean TikTok won\u2019t be missed, though.<\/p>\n \u201cI think the fans will be affected the most overall,\u201d Gestetner said. \u201cBut I do think the Shorts experience and Reels experience is getting very good.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n