Sorry to be late to the party everyone! For my assignment, I decided to tackle my irritation with Tik Tok.
As a Drama teacher, I have always been irritated by trends that encourage my students to use contrived ideas and movement rather than creating their own. This irritation started at a young age when I discovered that I found line dances like ‘The Macarena’ tedious. It was not until recently, in a conversation I was having with a much younger friend about Tik Tok that I found my view challenged. She told me she thought I would be quite good on Tik Tok as I’m very creative, and that I should look at it more closely to find the creative art being made. It was her that suggested the #creatednotcopied hashtag as the one I might push as a Tik Tok user.
Upon spending (far too much) time scrolling through Tik Tok, I found that she was right. Admits the copies, there were also truly creative videos being made. I decided I wanted to explore what motivated users to create what they were posting, and to explore how one might use the apps innate features to encourage creativity. This video is the result of my explorations.
I realise it’s a bit on the long side, and I apologise for that! I’m hoping you’ll find it sufficiently engaging as a trade off. I am also going to include a Gdrive link in case YouTube blocks any of my sound. A transcript of the video is linked in the YouTube description, but I’ll include it HERE as well.
Suzzie
Hi Suzzie,
I loved your analysis of TiK Tok. Your use of background music, VideoScribe, and Tik Toking yourself really make your presentation engaging. It’s interesting both of us are drawn to such concepts like “produsage”, “smart swarm” and “participatory culture” etc. when thinking of the affordances of mobile technologies. It is true that applications and technologies that allow for socialization, easy remix and room for creativity will help generate more content producers.
Hi Ceci;
Thanks so much! I like to try and understand how pop culture affects the creative thinking of my students. Pop culture these days seems to grow and be consumed online, increasingly through apps like Tik Tok! I think the app has a lot of potential for creative behaviour, but I definitely find myself confounded when I see a direct copy of another video with thousands of likes. It was a challenge to make sure all of the information was communicated in an engaging way as I knew the video was a little lengthy. I’ve found VideoScribe is a good way to allow the viewer to recognise when I’m quoting; I don’t want to accidentally plagiarise! Videoleap, the iPhone app I used to edit all the elements together, is a new tool for me, but I am really enjoying the functionality of the tools and effects it offers!
Suzzie
Thank you, Suzzie! I didn’t know that you used an iPhone app to assemble the elements. That’s so cool! I’m going to download Videoleap and give it a try. Merci beaucoup!