TikTok seems to be engaged on an integration with Lemon8, one other social app owned by TikTok’s Beijing-based father or mother firm, ByteDance, based on new findings from product intelligence agency Watchful.ai. The obvious new partnership sees TikTok creating a function that might enable customers to sync their Lemon8 posts to TikTok, then add sounds and music to the posts utilizing TikTok’s editor.
Watchful couldn’t present screenshots of the function in query, however notes that its methodology makes use of a mix of laptop imaginative and prescient, machine studying algorithms, and move evaluation of publicly accessible information to determine and emulate app adjustments. That enables Watchful to find options earlier than they launch publicly, because it has achieved many instances earlier than. Most just lately, it uncovered TikTok options in improvement just like the AI chatbot Tako, a devoted Store feed, video stickers, and extra.
TikTok didn’t reply to a number of requests for touch upon the matter.
Lemon8, as you could recall, quickly rose up the App Retailer charts earlier this yr across the similar time that U.S. lawmakers had been discussing transferring ahead with a TikTok ban or compelled sale. The app, a life-style social community, had initially launched in arch 2020 however was artificially inflated on TikTok this spring.
With suspicious timing, the app “went viral” on TikTok’s video platform after quite a few influencers posted constructive movies selling Lemon8 utilizing comparable language describing it as a mixture of Pinterest and Instagram. Not one of the movies we got here throughout on the time indicated they had been sponsored content material or advertisements. This compelled reputation, in flip, pushed Lemon8 into the High 10 Total apps within the U.S. App Retailer for a number of days in March 2023.
Forward of this, Insider reported that ByteDance had been paying creators to submit about Lemon8 on TikTok to seed its preliminary U.S. person base and content material.
From the appears to be like of issues, it appeared that ByteDance’s hope was that Lemon8 might function one thing of a backup plan to realize U.S. customers’ engagement and a spotlight within the occasion of a full TikTok ban.
If the newly noticed cross-posting function does, in actual fact, roll out extra publicly, ByteDance would have the ability to leverage TikTok as soon as once more to additional acquire consideration for Lemon8, driving new installs and adoption. Nonetheless, it’s unclear right now if or when the cross-pollination function will launch, or whether or not it’s solely one thing into consideration for now.