Entry vs Discovery

The evolution of social media

It takes a Hollywood filmmaker a few years to make a movie and the audience 2 hours to watch. It takes a YouTuber a few weeks to make a video and the audience 10 minutes to consume.

Now, it takes a TikToker less than an hour to do everything and the audience less than 1 minute to finish.

Before TikTok, every social media platform lowers the barrier to entry, making it easier for ordinary people to create.

As a creator, you don’t need a book deal to blog or a million-dollar budget to distribute videos. As a consumer, you don’t need to block out hours for reading a blog or watching a YouTube video. You just need minutes.

While the barrier to entry is lowered, the barrier to discovery is still too high.

Even though more creators are created, they are not being recommended by algorithms. The biggest YouTubers and bloggers keep getting the most traffic while the new ones stay unnoticed for years until they give up.

The paradox of discovery pre-TikTok is: You need views to get big, but you need to be big to get views.

With its randomized autoplay video feeds, TikTok is the first platform to significantly lower barriers to discovery. TikTok explicitly states that they do NOT base recommendations on follower count or on a history of previous high-performing videos. Meaning even if you have 0 follower, you might still be recommended by TikTok’s algorithm.

Post-TikTok, everyone has a chance to create AND be discovered.

The future of social media is no longer just about lowering barriers to entry. It's about lowering barriers to discovery.

---

Khóa học “Học Cách Học” của MỞ chính thức mở đơn đăng ký cho cohort #1. Hai người đứng lớp là 2 người tôi nghiêng mình kính nể nhất trong chuyện học trọn đời, các bạn có thể xem thêm thông tin chi tiết ở đây:

Tôi cũng dạy blogging. Đăng ký danh sách chờ Writing on The Net #2: