“Unlike Instagram, Facebook or Snapchat, TikTok didn’t build itself around social connections. Its goal is pure, uncut entertainment. The algorithm ingested every data point it could from what users skipped, liked or shared — and spat it directly into the maddeningly habit-forming For You Page. Fans whispered reverently that it knew them better than they knew themselves.” Sapna Maheshwari wonders: “Has there ever been an app more American seeming than TikTok, with its messy democratic creativity, exhibitionism, utter lack of limits and vast variety of hustlers. And yet, of course, TikTok is not American…” NYT (Gift Article): Love, Hate or Fear It, TikTok Has Changed America. “Here are 19 ways of understanding how TikTok became part of American life … Even if you’ve never opened the app, you’ve lived in a culture that exists downstream of what happens there.”