Why Reddit hires Dubsmash to challenge TikTok
Social news site Reddit acquires Dubsmash, a rival short video app to popular TikTok. All the details
Social networking company Reddit said on Sunday that it will purchase the Dubsmash short video platform. It is the latest company to expand into an industry dominated by TikTok owned by Chinese ByteDance.
Indeed, the success of TikTok has prompted many social media companies to add short video services to their platforms. From Snapchat which launched “Spotlight” in November and Facebook “Instagram Reels” earlier this year. According to Dubsmash, the company has had talks about a possible acquisition with both Facebook and Snapchat.
But behind Reddit's decision there is also a “politically correct” motivation. The platform has had problems with racism lately. Reddit has been criticized for not doing enough to stop hate speech or for providing moderators targeted by racist trolls with sufficient support. As TechCrunch points out, the credit for much of Dubsmash's success goes to Black and Latinx users. If many of TikTok's high-profile stars are white, Dubsmash is known for its large communities of Black and Latinx content creators.
All the details.
REDDIT ENGAGES DUBSASH
Reddit bought Dubsmash. Both companies reported this in a statement . Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but a Reddit spokesperson said the acquisition was based on a combination of cash and stock.
DETAILS OF THE OPERATION
The San Francisco-based company added that Dubsmash will retain its platform and brand, but its video creation tools will also be integrated into Reddit.
The entire Dubsmash team, including co-founders Suchit Dash, Jonas Drüppel and Tim Specht, will join Reddit.
THE REDDIT STRATEGY TO CHALLENGE TIKTOK
As Reddit explained in the note, the deal will give its users, who can already upload and stream video, access to Dubsmash's editing and short video creation tools.
DUBSMASH BEHIND THE CHINESE APP ONLY
According to Crunchbase data, Dubsmash raised $ 20.2 million from investors including Lowercase Capital, Index Ventures, Eniac Ventures, Heartcore Capital and Sunstone Life.
As TechCrunch points out, Dubsmash is now one of TikTok's biggest rivals, but it struggled for several years after a brief stint in popularity in 2015 during its first appearance as a lip-syncing video app. In 2017 it started to transform into a social platform and moved its headquarters from Berlin to Brooklyn. Earlier this year, Dubsmash's share of the US small-form video market was second only to TikTok when counted for app installs.
BET ON DIVERSITY
In its announcement, Reddit linked the Dubsmash acquisition to its inclusion efforts.
Seventh most visited site in the US and 18th in the world according to the latest data from Alexa Internet, Reddit also highlighted Dubsmash's commitment to promoting diversity. "Just as Reddit is a place for content you won't see anywhere else on the internet, Dubsmash provides a platform that welcomes creators and underrepresented users on social media," the note reads. "About 25% of African American teenagers in the US are on Dubsmash, and women make up 70% of users."
TIKTOK BEATS DUBSMASH AND CONTINUES TO OPERATE IN THE UNITED STATES
But on the numbers TikTok has no equal. Dubsmash collects over one billion videos viewed per month. In comparison, the numbers of TikTok speak of one billion videos viewed per day on a global scale.
Meanwhile, on December 4, the deadline given by the Trump administration to TikTok to find a buyer and continue to operate in the US expired. The White House had ordered the sale of TikTok's US assets last August, fearing that Chinese ownership could pose a national security risk.
But the company continues to keep its app running in America for now. And without any blockages. As reported by Bloomberg , Donald Trump has decided not to give a further extension to the deadline, but the current one "will be neglected", to allow the dialogue between the administration and the company to move forward.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/perche-reddit-ingaggia-dubsmash-per-sfidare-tiktok/ on Mon, 14 Dec 2020 13:30:58 +0000.