Google and Meta find video app success where TikTok is banned

The global leader in short video was swept up in a purge of Chinese apps by India after a violent border clash two years ago. That gave the impetus for Google’s YouTube Shorts service as well as Moj and a slew of other contenders to fill the void. Far from blunting the growth of social video, TikTok’s abrupt withdrawal has supercharged the segment. — AP

Prateek Bhardwaj broke out as a social media star on TikTok’s short-video platform, drawing in close to a million followers and a slew of big-brand endorsements. But he’s no longer on the app.

The 30-year-old from small-town India defected to Moj, one of several Google-backed TikTok clones that sprouted after New Delhi banned the app from China’s ByteDance Ltd’s in 2020. He barely missed a beat: his fan base has ballooned to 3.4 million and the content creator still plugs products from Xiaomi phones to Diageo whiskey.