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Yesterday K-pop boy band BTS released a 30-second clip of their latest single on TikTok. Then the app crashed.
Shortly after the clip was posted to TikTok, the search function of the app stopped working. People trying to search for things on TikTok were greeted with messages saying the app is unable to connect. The rest of the app seemed to work correctly, but BTS fans took credit for the search bomb.
The BTS Army took credit for the search bombing the discovery portion of the TikTok app into not working.
That should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention, K-pop fans are known for their rabid following. BTS partner websites regularly experience outages when new concert tickets, merchandise, and songs debut online. Despite the BTS Army being proud of the outage, TikTok says there was no app crash.
Speaking to The Verge, a TikTok representative says the BTS Army isn’t responsible for this one. They also say they’re not censoring opinions critical of China and LGBT issues, either. Either way, TikTok says the wrong link for the clip was shared, resulting in the error. As soon as TikTok replaced the link, the search portion of the app started returning results.
Some of TikTok’s biggest creators are participating in the #onchallenge hashtag inspired by the release. TikTok has racked up over 38.3 million views since it launched less than 24 hours ago.
TikTok’s role as a music promotion tool is quickly becoming mainstream.
Lil Nas X and “Old Town Road” enjoyed massive success after launching on the platform. Justin Bieber took note and joined the platform to promote his new single, “Yummy.” TikTok is launching careers in the same way SoundCloud gained focus for launching rap careers just a few years ago.
The latest BTS album, Map of the Soul: 7, is now available to stream. This TikTok hashtag challenge is just one way future artists will promote themselves using TikTok to gain an edge.
the real answer is who the fuck cares