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"TikTok, Do Your Thing": User Reactions to Social Surveillance in the Public Sphere
Meira Gilbert, Miranda Wei, Lindah Kotut
https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.20884

"TikTok, Do Your Thing": User Reactions to Social Surveillance in the Public Sphere
'TikTok, Do Your Thing'' is a viral trend where users attempt to identify strangers they see in public via information crowd-sourcing. The trend started as early as 2021 and users typically engage with it for romantic purposes (similar to a ''Missed Connections'' personal advertisement). This practice includes acts of surveillance and identification in the public sphere, although by peers rather than governments or corporations. To understand users' reactions to this trend we conducted a qualiâ…