Catherine Burges, Story Editor
@cburges_courant
Social media has been both a blessing and a curse on the culture of this generation, as it allows people to express themselves and improve self-confidence, but can also unintentionally degrade self-esteem. One of the newest, most popular apps is TikTok. This video-sharing platform might be the world’s fastest-growing social media app. A couple of NCHS seniors have gained a degree of fame through this app, while others use it more as a creative outlet.
An owner of an account, Senior Dylan Pescatore, didn’t always plan on having one of his videos go viral. “I wasn’t really into it at first, I thought it was kind of dumb, maybe for kids,” he said. “But you know, two days, three days in I was hooked.”
Dylan is glad to be part of the experience with TikTok at NCHS. “ I am glad to be the guy who helped the creation of this culture at NCHS, but it still hasn’t blown up yet. I’ve seen how it has grown and progressed, and it will definitely blow up in a few weeks,” Dylan said. “TikTok is an app that combines expression, talents, and comedy, and it’s definitely increased my confidence, which is unexpected for a social media platform.”
Known for having two videos on TikTok go famous, Senior Kelsey Mottolese agrees that TikTok has certainly been a way for her to escape the stress that comes from college applications. “I got the app as a joke but then quickly realized that some of the videos were fun to make,” Kelsey said. “When my first video blew up, I made it because I was upset about my SAT scores and I was lucky it happened.”
Kelsey’s most famous video got 203.5K likes, and 817.1K views. “I woke up one morning and saw that my friend from L.A. texted me saying that I had just been on all of her friend’s ‘For You Pages,’ and that I was famous,” she said. “ When I saw that my video was already at 200k views I was blown away and so excited.” “It was incredible to feel that other people found my sense of humor relatable and that I could share my creativity on a new platform.”
TikTok is a new form of entertainment for teens and their friends to collaborate their ideas and abilities together. Sophomore Alex Novotony, who runs the account @daboysssss, believes Tik Tok has affected him and his friends who used the app. “It hasn’t really changed me personally, but it brought me and my friends closer together,” he said. “We bonded over TikTok.” Alex then described how he and his friends first created the account together. “We were all just together one day, signed into TikTok and made a video,” he said. “We looked at things we saw on the ‘For You Page’ to inspire us.”
Alex didn’t expected some of their videos to go viral, but agrees that although TikTok hasn’t been a huge part of his life personally, “It gives society a sense of humor to enjoy comedy, is a way to escape the pressures of everyday life, and is simply a platform to make you laugh.”
