The preternatural, unearthing AI that powers the next generation of internet usage made a mystical force out of simple yet complex math. Now, individuals have a more transparent mirror showing them their true colours. Any type of business can leverage the influence of TikTok and the algorithm dependent on AI and ML that makes it one of the fastest-growing social media apps, given its power to read the minds of users and potential customers. How it achieves what’s unachievable for many other diamonds in the rough triggers many individuals’ curiosities, especially since it’s almost impossible to escape the addictiveness of the platform’s “for you” section once you’ve gained a taste of it.
Technological advancements grow by leaps and bounds and fuel a trend that is only set to expand and reach out to more and more individuals and businesses. Indubitably, TikTok creates the psychoanalysis of its users for the profits gained, and AI is the element fuelling its prowess.
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TikTok uses the latest technology to remain a leader
TikTok remains the leading platform for short-format videos, whose underlying purpose is to deliver quality information quickly so that users long for more. Videos cannot exceed 15 seconds, which is where the platform succeeds in pushing creators to give their best in this specific timeframe.
As a platform estimated to exceed 1.8 billion users in the following three months, it’s easy to see that it’s not just a fad but a presence that will stick with us longer than imagined. The app relies on the latest, cutting-edge technology to grow its popularity and features, namely, machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI). Additionally, it collects lessons from the data to further curate more customised content and improve the algorithm. To understand how powerful AI is, it’s enough to remember that IBM’s AI “Deep Blue” invention could outclass the global chess champion.
What are AI and ML anyway?
AI and ML are the talk of the town these days in subjects related to or unrelated to technology. Everyone has different opinions about these topics and their power to establish or negatively impact the future, as those sticking to conventional visions tend to believe.
The highly-debated AI sector replaces the human need to develop ideas, solutions, and model implementations, as it simulates human intelligence and can craft algorithms, or rule sets, to analyse and draw conclusions from gathered data.
It’s easy to see why users struggle to unglue from their mobile devices. The platform is set to transform the world of social media content for the average user and business alike. It fuels many other trends, encouraging people to develop their TikTok accounts, attract followers, create communities, and pass on knowledge to other interested parties.
Monolith – the one-of-a-kind system fueling the platform’s success
TikTok uses a unique recommendation system called Monolith to provide a personalised customer experience that moulds depending on the users’ changing preferences. This way, there mystery behind the “addictive TikTok content keeping users hooked for hours” is deciphered. The system combines processes like real-time adaptation, collisionless hashing, and online training that, once debunked, can make the average fervent user aware of the mechanisms that make TikTok such an outstanding platform.
A practical example
Imagine a customer entering a garment shop to find a suitable and stylish pair of jeans. Managers display merchandise depending on their category, department, cloth quality, price, model, functionality, etc. Similarly, TikTok uses its algorithm to sort different types of content depending this time on their genre, be it the type of challenge videos, how-to-es, cooking recipes, collages, and more, so that it can, in a blink of an eye, find the relevant content and recommend it to the user depending on their previously-created profile.
This real-time recommender system comprises two parts that work independently from one another, working towards the goal of minimising latency. There are challenges, such as the numerous items that create the relevance score.
However, there are also solutions to the obstacles encountered, such as Parabel, PECOS, clustering, or ANN, which together improve the technicalities of the platform. Furthermore, the ASAP model is at the core of the precision with which the program makes real-time data-based predictions.
Tastes are ever-changing, and adaptive platforms are poised for enduring prosperity
Needless to say, users’ preferences in videos are likely to change over time and as trends go by. Hence, it’s only normal for the algorithm to be so efficiently optimised to catch up with scrollers’ interests and continue to recommend relevant content while keeping up with their changing behaviour. This part is where many other apps lag; they remain stuck within a prototype and stop meeting customers’ needs and wants when they evolve.
15 minutes of fame
15 minutes of fame is a long-rooted concept that posits that celebrities in the limelight only enjoy profound fame for this time frame, after which they slowly leave the public’s interest and get forgotten. The notion was famous long ago, but now it’s no longer the case. The 15 Seconds of Fame has replaced this paradigm due to the Chinese platform TikTok, which presents short-video formats and video-sharing features that allow anyone to add music to the background, information, choreographies, and act performances. The accessibility, intuitiveness, and breakthrough technology behind the app fuelled its enormous rise to popularity.
Other Chinese platforms have also broken into the market but haven’t gained as much traction as TikTok. Its algorithm is the secret recipe to the fame achieved, and it’s highly unlikely that another project will come as close to it as soon as possible.
Closing words
As the tech sector constantly develops, so is the algorithm behind TikTok and its recommendation system. These contribute to shaping a personalised experience that keeps users glued to their mobile devices for hours. Monolith system’s features help generate tailored content, so it’s essential to acknowledge its ins and outs in order to make the most out of this digital mind-enriching experience.
