The TikTok War Didn’t Cause the TikTok Boom

Dubbing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “the first TikTok war” is by now a cliché,  but we still have very little insight into what that has meant for TikTok itself—whether the deluge of user-generated content from the frontlines has attracted new users, advertisers, and revenue to the social media app.

When the Gulf War of 1991 announced CNN to the world, the financial impact on the cable news trailblazer was soon evident. The ensuing surge in viewers and advertisers fueled a 21% increase in the network’s revenue that year, the New York Times reported at the time. But operating profit actually dropped by 11% because covering a war is expensive: CNN had to pay war correspondents and satellite transmission fees while ensuring its staff remained safe from the cruise missiles, air raids, and heavy artillery.