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Well, it officially happened. At around 10:45 p.m. ET on Saturday night, TikTok officially halted operations in the United States prior to a law banning the app going into effect.
Reuters previously reported that TikTok shutting down the app completely is not what the federal ban requires. The law only mandates that new TikTok downloads are not allowed in Apple or Google’s app stores. Existing TikTok users could still continue using the app. But instead, the app decided to halt operations in the country.
As a result, TikTok users in the U.S. went into meltdown mode on Saturday night as they accepted their new reality.
I THOUGHT WE HAD TILL MIDNIGHT #riptiktok pic.twitter.com/5MjVdvOgva
— king julian (@JulianColin1) January 19, 2025
introducing: the unemployed girls @kingkrabbyp #riptiktok pic.twitter.com/p98CmSyFxK
— hannah montoya (@hannahcmontoya) January 19, 2025
My fyp knew me better than I knew myself… #RIPTikTok pic.twitter.com/ND1iqk8XsI
— Jay (@astrojayyyy721) January 19, 2025
Where Do We Go From Here With TikTok Now Banned In The United States?
President-elect Donald Trump and others lawmakers have discussed plans to reverse the ban, and TikTok says it will be able to restore service for American users in a relatively short time frame if they are able to do so.
Yahoo found Mark Cuban has also discussed creating a new alternative to TikTok using the tech used to create BlueSky
“There’s an app called Bluesky and it’s built on the AT Protocol,” Cuban said. “I would be open to investing in supporting anybody — or somebody who creates a TikTok replacement built on the AT Protocol. So if you’ve got that ability, let me know in the comments.
“If you create an MVP — a minimum viable product — so I can see it, that’s all the better, because obviously, I think you’d have a whole lot of support. And more importantly, when you build on the AT Protocol, it’s extensible, so that means nobody can just buy it, nobody can just close it.”
Who knows what the next step is for TikTok in the United States. But what we do know is that users are currently locked out, and they’re not at all happy about it.