TikTok brings in text posts to rival Elon Musk’s X

By Anna Cooban, CNN

London (CNN) — TikTok will now allow users to post text-only content for the first time in a challenge to Elon Musk’s beleaguered X, formerly known as Twitter.

Announcing the new post format Monday, the video streaming platform said it would broaden “options for creators to share their ideas and express their creativity.”

“With text posts, we’re expanding the boundaries of content creation for everyone on TikTok, giving the written creativity we’ve seen in comments, captions, and videos a dedicated space to shine,” the company said in a statement.

Users are now able to share “stories, poems, recipes, and other written content,” which can be customized by adding sound, stickers and background colors, among other features.

In perhaps the most direct challenge to the X platform, text posts on TikTok will allow users to tag other accounts and add hashtags that relate to trending topics.

The latest move by TikTok, which is owned by China’s ByteDance, may prove to be another knock for Musk, whose takeover of X in October has resulted in mass layoffs, a huge drop in advertising revenue and controversial changes to the platform’s verification policy.

Earlier this month, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, launched Threads, a rival social media site. Threads surpassed 100 million user sign-ups in its first week.

Musk re-branded Twitter to X Monday, giving the platform a new website domain and logo.

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