TikTok blew up off those short dance and comedy clips, but now it’s making a mega move into longer videos. RIP to the “Creator Fund” that paid OG creators—it’s getting replaced by this “Creativity Program” thing where you only get cash for videos longer than a minute.
Kinda wild seeing TikTok pull a total 180 from its roots as the app for bite-sized viral snippets. It’s basically following the same road as Instagram, Facebook and YouTube now—they all tried to jack TikTok’s style at first but make bank off long videos. TikTok’s finally chasing those fat stacks too.
But not every creator’s here for it. Some worry focusing on long-form might drain away what made TikTok so fire in the first place. That endless stream of spontaneous dancing and memes you could tap through in seconds, no fancy editing required? Yeah, RIP to that—now you actually gotta put thought into quality longer content.
One popular creator, Nikki Apostolou or “recycldstardust,” said “I don’t always have a minute of content in me.” And that’s facts—not everyone wants to only post highly-produced long videos.
But TikTok just keeps stretching what counts as a video, from 15 seconds to now a whopping 15 minutes. And with this new program, they’re crystal clear they want adult creators with 10k+ followers posting 1-minute+ vids. No more endless scrolling for funny short clips; they want that long-form engagement and edutainment now.
We’ll see if the fans are down to watch longer content instead of that quick fix of absurdist videos they’re used to. But money talks, so RIP short videos? TikTok’s future is lookin’ lengthy.
