Facebook will pay TikTok stars to post on Instagram Reels (its new TikTok knock-off)

5th degree Zucking... Facebook's perpetual MO to crush competitors: bring their most successful feature to Instagram. In 2016, FB essentially crushed Snap Stories by launching Instagram Stories. In 2018, FB tried to take on YouTube by intro'ing IGTV. In May 2020, FB threatened Amazon by shipping "Shops" for ecommerce on Insta. Then FB started obsessing over the fact that TikTok has been downloaded over 2B times. So...

• FB will try to kill TikTok with its Reels feature on (you guessed it) Instagram. Reels, which is launching in the US in August, lets users make short vids with musical tracks (sounds promising).
• Double whammy: For Chinese-owned TikTok, which has major trust issues. India just banned TikTok over security/spying concerns, and TikTok is facing political threats of the same fate in the US.
• Triple whammy: FB announced Reels back in November, so that's an old whammy. The new whammy: FB is reportedly paying popular TikTok stars to leave TikTok and post on Reels, instead.

"Reel it in, I got a bag"... FB has the $$$ to not only nab TikTok's product, but also its content. According to the WSJ's infamous "people familiar with the matter" (#PFWTM):

• Insta has made big offers to some of TikTok's top creators. The biggest $$$ goes to those who ditch the Tok completely and go Reels-exclusive.
• FB hopes that these influencers will bring their millions of followers over to Reels. That's why TikTok just announced a $200M fund of its own to counter Facebook's courting and keep stars on TikTok.