As TikTok fights a new law requiring a divestiture from its Chinese owner, smaller rivals may be reaping some of the benefits.
One is Clapper, the short-video app launched in 2020, which saw a fourfold increase in downloads as Congress moved to pass the TikTok legislation and four two weeks afterward, according to its founder, Edison Chen.
Clapper has been averaging about 200,000 new weekly downloads. President Joe Biden signed national security legislation on April 24 that requires that TikTok’s owner, China’s ByteDance, to divest its social media platform within a year or face a ban on app stores in the United States.
TikTok, meanwhile, has filed suit to stop the new law, citing the First Amendment. Clapper averages about 300,000 daily active users and 2 million monthly active users, a fraction of the audience for TikTok.
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