Editor’s Be aware: This text was written for Mosaic, an impartial journalism coaching program for highschool college students who report and {photograph} tales underneath the steerage {of professional} journalists.
TikTok’s potential ban feels all too acquainted to Sudi Roudi, a San Jose small enterprise proprietor.
The USA ban on TikTok, whereas momentary, raised fears of broader censorship, as practiced by Iran, the place she grew up.
Relatively than look ahead to the threatened ban to happen, Roudi ready by directing her 22,300 TikTok followers to her enterprise web site and hyperlink to her different social media.
“I’m, like, wait, I literally ran away from this,” Roudi stated about her response to the proposed ban. “I’m just very scared because I see all the little stuff that Iran had 30 years ago when everything was free. Slowly, things changed.”
Based on a 2023 research from TikTok and Oxford Economics on the worth of the app, 890,000 small companies in California use TikTok, and 40% name the platform “critical” to their enterprise.
Simply forward of the scheduled shutdown on the night of Jan. 18, TikTok’s website was inaccessible within the U.S. A message on the house web page learn, “Sorry, TikTok is unavailable right now.” Nevertheless, after lower than a day, the app was again in motion, and a brand new message credited President Donald Trump with pausing the ban for 75 days.
For small enterprise house owners, a ban might have an effect on how they make a dwelling, develop their clientele and hold facet hustles afloat. However some house owners aren’t very nervous.
Viviana Estrada started designing her personal nails in 2023, and shortly expanded her work to her relations’ and shut mates’ nails.
Estrada, a senior in finance at Santa Clara College, stated she doesn’t need the nail enterprise to be her important supply of earnings, so she solely posts on Instagram when she chooses to advertise her designs.
“I was thinking about using TikTok, but I felt weird about posting public things,” she stated.
However different small companies threat shedding wanted help from their followers, Estrada stated. “Creators gain partnerships and sponsorships from TikTok,” she stated. “Small businesses can gain and lose — the reaction is quick.”
On a nook of Publish Avenue in downtown San Jose, a small store brightly coloured with pink and orange partitions shows female drawings, candles formed like truffles and trinkets. That is the place Roudi, 33, and two different ladies artists run Cub ‘n Cony.
Because her art includes drawings of naked women, she said she would never have been able to make her art in Iran.
“If I were to draw my pin-ups, because the government rule is Islamic and women are not supposed to show anything, that would be a jail offense for me,” she said.
After business slowed on her Etsy art site, Roudi built her TikTok presence and saw a significant growth in clientele. Along with her online presence and physical store in San Jose, Roudi posts weekly videos, such as displaying the process of her art-making or showing how she ships packages.
“It was like one of the only platforms I remember in 2021 and 2022 where there was growth,” she said. “It helped me be able to connect with the customers out here.”
TikTok’s research is in step with Roudi’s expertise of how her enterprise grew. The research discovered that 56% of California TikTok customers purchased merchandise that they noticed on the app and 33% bodily visited the small enterprise after watching a video from the maker.
Nevertheless, Roudi stated she has seen a small decline in gross sales lately, which she attributes to TikTok’s algorithms that spotlight viral traits. Roudi stated she now depends extra on Instagram.
Jennifer Sarellano, 17, stated Instagram drives her crochet enterprise. The John F. Kennedy Excessive College scholar runs her enterprise from her house in Fremont.
“I had local connections through church and school that I could sell to,” Sarellano stated. “Instagram helped me with sales that were more distant.”
When requested how she felt about TikTok, Sarellano stated different apps are easier.
“I don’t really care about the ban,” she stated. “I didn’t try TikTok because it was time-consuming to make videos.”
Small enterprise house owners like Sarellano and Roudi understand they’ve choices.
Roudi stated having different social media apps supplies a buffer. “I feel like everything is kind of going back to blogging, because all the social media algorithms suck or they go away or they get banned.”
Autumn Alvarez is majoring in journalism at San Francisco State College.
