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This week’s Media Briefing looks at how the TikTok ban has affected publishers’ web traffic and social referrals, as well as what companies like CNN, The Daily Mail and The Washington Post are doing with their short videos in light of the shutdown drama.
TikTok’s shutdown over the weekend was short-lived, as was its apparent impact on how people spent their time online. Visits to publishers’ websites and social networks have not deviated from normal, and YouTube Shorts, for example, have seen a slight increase in viewership.
Publishers like CNN, The Daily Mail and The Washington Post were unfazed by TikTok’s flogging 12-hour shutdown on the 18th-19th Januarysaid executives in publications.
That’s probably good news, given that this was potentially a teaser for what could happen in less than 75 days when the extension ends.
The label’s executives told Digiday that their focus this year is to integrate and distribute short-form video on their own devices, and that their work over the years to diversify audience development efforts across multiple platforms — including their own — means they’re ready for anything. will happen next time.
“Our strategy and approach remain consistent as we continue to operate as usual. We have always prioritized diversification and avoided relying on any single platform,” said Chris Anthony, CRO at Gallery Media Group.
Minimal domino effect of shutting down TikTok on web traffic
US views on TikTok fell 19.7% (to 9.62 billion) from January 18 to January 19, according to data Tubular Labs shared with Digiday. Meanwhile, YouTube Shorts views rose less than 1% over the same time period, from 6.73 billion on January 18th to 6.79 billion on January 19th. But it wasn’t an unusual audience stat — YouTube Shorts had 7.40 billion views in the US as of January 1, according to Tubular Labs, for example.
Web infrastructure company Cloudflare looked at Domain Name System (DNS) traffic to TikTok-related domains (including TikTok and other ByteDance-owned platforms such as video editor CapCut) and found that two days after TikTok’s initial shutdown, DNS traffic down 7% from the previous week’s shutdown.
And while Cloudflare detected that DNS traffic on TikTok alternatives like RedNote grew by as much as 74% on January 19 – the day the ban went into effect – compared to the previous week, traffic declined from there and was only 17% higher than the previous week after TikTok announced it was starting to restore its services in US (When asked about user trends on other platforms at the time, a Cloudflare spokesperson said it was “difficult to attribute general increases in traffic” to the TikTok ban.)
While TikTok’s viewership in the US stopped during the app ban, it returned to normal levels once TikTok was active again, according to Phil Harvey, head of social video at the Daily Mail.
But when TikTok didn’t work, what did people do with their time online? Chartbeat data shared with Digiday shows that while TikTok was down, publishers’ online behavior didn’t really change much. The publisher analytics firm found that overall US traffic on more than 1,100 publisher sites was unchanged before and after the ban.
There also hasn’t been much change when looking at page views from all social visits across more than 1,000 US publishers, according to a Chartbeat analysis.
So did people turn to other social media platforms when TikTok was down?
While the Daily Mail saw a “surge in visitors” to both YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels over the weekend, TikTok viewership “[returned] to the status quo” once the ban was lifted, Harvey said. He refused to provide specific numbers.
Here’s how some publishers are dealing with the fallout from the US TikTok ban:
Focus on YouTube Shorts
The Washington Post’s director of video Micah Gelman told Digiday that his team had been preparing for the ban for some time — and part of the reason his division, which includes the TikTok Post team, was recently renamed to The Washington Post Universe to have the same branding across social platforms. And why his team is focused on expanding its YouTube Shorts presence. Gelman declined to quantify YouTube Shorts The Post’s viewership compared to TikTok, saying it varied “day to day” and that “many days” YouTube’s audience is larger. The Post also declined to share viewership figures for the videos from the weekend.
“We anticipated that. We planned it. It’s something we thought was a clear possibility and we told our audience where they could find us,” he said.
The Post was more direct about that messaging to its TikTok viewers in videos and in the comments section, especially leading up to the app’s ban, Gelman said. This video posted Dec. 6 features host Carmella Boykin, who directs viewers to things like Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.
In 2024, The Washington Post Universe YouTube channel gained 300,000 subscribers, a 24% year-over-year increase, according to a Post spokesperson.
Testing the new video center
Meanwhile, the Daily Mail introduced a hub for all its short video content on its US homepage when TikTok shut down. The idea for the center has been in the works for “quite a while,” Harvey said, though he declined to say exactly how long the center has been planned.
“Given the news of the ban and the fact that it’s happening more and more often, we decided it would be an ideal time to test the initiative… While the ban didn’t last long, the hub was a fun experiment to test how we package and deliver our video content to the homepage ,” Harvey said.
Harvey declined to quantify how many site visitors watched videos on the hub when it was live during the TikTok ban.
The Daily Mail produced nearly 75 vertical videos on Monday, the day of the US president’s inauguration, according to Harvey. TikTok brought in the most video views with 322 million, followed by 25 million on Instagram, 5.3 million on YouTube Shorts and 2.6 million on Facebook. The Daily Mail had less than 1 million views on X.
TikTok is not a priority on the weekend
At CNN, TikTok’s brief shutdown didn’t have enough of an impact to spend much energy on it — especially since its teams were focused on President Donald Trump’s inauguration over the weekend, according to a spokesperson.
That’s especially true as CNN focuses its video programming efforts on its own website and app this year, such as experimenting with more live vertical video, they added. The company is moving away from sharing videos cut from its TV programs on digital platforms like TikTok, favoring instead a more one-on-one format, like reporters talking from their kitchens before hitting the streets.
But these three publishers have significant audiences on TikTok — 7.2 million on CNN, 18.8 million on The Daily Mail and 1.8 million on The Washington Post. Despite this reach, the message is clear: if TikTok shuts down again, publishers will have to find ways to stay in front of this audience.
What we heard
“Some of them are monetary. Some of them are more about being part of the new markets they are developing. And for me, that part is the most interesting… I’d rather be a part of it… I’d rather be the first partner. I believe the terms of trade will only worsen over time.”
— Mark Howard, chief operating officer of Time, on how the publisher is evaluating deals with AI companies.
Numbers to know
400 million dollars: CNN’s revenue decline in three years.
97.4 million pounds: Analysts forecast Reach’s 2024 adjusted operating profit, which the publisher says will beat.
71%: Newsweek.com year-over-year increase in unique site visitors.
143: Number of Dotdash Meredith employees laid off.
What we discussed
Publishers are mixed on optimism for 2025
- A Digiday+ Research survey found that 60% of publishing professionals are optimistic about their companies’ prospects for 2025, but only 28% were for the industry.
- Two-thirds think their company’s revenue will grow year-over-year in 2025, with growth in advertising and subscription revenue.
Read more from Digiday+ Research here.
The winners and losers of the TikTok shutdown drama in the US
- TikTok’s rivals, Donald Trump, and the advertisers and creators who rely on the platform all stand to benefit from the unfolding TikTok drama.
- But TikTok’s US employees, users and small and medium-sized businesses could get the short end of the stick as the ban is still looming.
Find out who else stands to gain — or lose — amid the TikTok drama here.
Copyright cases focus on Meta and OpenAI datasets
- Unsealed court documents allege that Meta employees sought to remove copyright information — including headers and other identifiers — from various materials.
- Meanwhile, plaintiffs in a separate lawsuit between The New York Times and OpenAI say the tech companies removed copyright information from content used to train artificial intelligence models.
Read more about the copyright battles facing tech companies here.
Twitch streamers fear losing TikTok as a referral engine
- Creators on Twitch and other streaming platforms fear losing TikTok as a place to share clips of their live streams, one of the most effective ways to build an audience.
- Creators believe that the TikTok algorithm rewards smaller creators for posting clips of viral content.
Read more about what streaming platform creators will lose if TikTok shuts down here.
What we read
More lawsuits against AI companies are coming
The News Media Alliance, which includes members such as Condé Nast and Vox Media, is preparing to take legal action against a major AI company it claims is infringing copyrights, according to Semaphore. The unnamed company is accused of copying and pasting content without attribution or license.
The New York Times is looking for other publishers to bundle subscriptions
The New York Times is looking to combine subscriptions with smaller U.S. publishers to increase its subscriber base to 11 million, Axios reported. It’s a strategy that aims to expand its international subscriptions and will focus on its lifestyle products such as cooking and gaming.
Apple removes AI news alerts after BBC complaints
Apple has disabled AI summaries for news apps in its beta software after the BBC said it was showing inaccurate information in its news, according to CNBC. In December, nearly two dozen BBC announcements were combined into an incorrect three-part headline about Luigi Mangione, the man who shot and killed UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
Bluesky, X launches new video channels to compete with TikTok
Social media platforms Bluesky and X have launched new video channels in the shadow of the TikTok ban in the US, The Verge reported. Bluesky introduced customizable video sources, while X launched a video card.
French newspaper Le Monde leaves X
Le Monde — like the Guardian and NPR before it — will no longer publish on X, according to Politico. The French daily’s editor-in-chief said he was encouraging Le Monde journalists to do the same, blaming Elon Musk’s political activism and platform toxicity for the decision to leave.