TikTok's Secret "Heating Button" Can Make Any Video Go Viral

A report from Forbes exposed a secret "heating" button that TikTok employees have been using to control which videos go viral by promoting them specifically to users' For You pages. This type of feature has long been suspected but the admission feels like a new level of transparency on how the king-making backend functionality of popular social media platforms may actually work.

While the story has generated some blowback, it's not unusual. The New York Times, for example, has always had its own similar ability through the contradictory editorial choices it makes to ignore data and arbitrarily choose certain books to include or exclude from their bestseller list. While we sometimes might want to believe that the best content (or the best books) will get the views and recognition simply because they deserve it ... the reality is this type of success is routinely far more manufactured and controlled than we realize.