SAN FRANCISCO (US) – Facebook on Wednesday came out with its own version of TikTok in the US and more than 50 countries by embedding a new short-form video service named Reels in Instagram.
This comes days after Microsoft said it was holding discussions to acquire TikTok from its parent China-owned ByteDance. The advent of Reels will stoke the embers of rivalry between Facebook and TikTok with each viewing the other as a threat. Both are wooing teenagers, a good chunk of whom have become fans of TikTok in the past two years.
Reels was first tested in Brazil in 2018 and later in France, Germany and India, which was TikTok’s biggest market until New Delhi banned it last month following a border clash with China. Although Facebook brought out a standalone app named Lasso, it failed to garner attention.
Like in TikTok, users of Reels can record short vertical videos, add special effects and soundtracks before uploading them.
These similarities have made TikTok CEO Kevin Mayer call Reels a “copycat product”.
(Photos syndicated via Reuters)
This story has been edited by BH staff and is published from a syndicated field