This is an initiative that will delight parents of teenagers: TikTok will immediately impose a time limit on its users under 18, reports the magazine Forbes. The cleaver will fall off after 60 minutes of daily use.
Don’t open the champagne right away: users will be able to enter a code to continue watching the short videos that scroll by at breakneck speed on the platform. The idea, however, is to force them to take action to continue using the application, rather than being absorbed by it.
This new default setting will be phased in over the next few weeks. The decision was taken in a context where the intensive use of TikTok raises concerns about its impact on young people, as was the case for all those that preceded it such as Facebook, SnapChat or Instagram.
The initiative is interesting, but its effectiveness may be limited, says the professor in the addiction service at the University of Sherbrooke Andrée-Anne Légaré. “The responsibility lies with the user, and teenagers don’t necessarily have a good perspective on their use,” she notes. In addition, those who have exhausted their hour of daily use will still be able to satisfy their need for content on other platforms, such as Instagram or YouTube, which can be just as problematic in terms of use, recalls the expert.
TikTok is one of the most popular — if not the most popular — apps among teens today.
