Taking back and giving back on TikTok: Algorithmic mutual aid in the platform economy

Abstract

This article explores three genres of TikTok content in which creators and users collaborate to re(direct) the value they create on-platform toward specific needs, people, and causes. Drawing from literatures on platform economies, user and creator labor, algorithmic imaginaries and resistance, and mutual aid, we used algorithmic ethnography to identify and define major genres of content, eventually creating a sample of 192 TikTok videos (including comments and metadata) and conducting a thematic analysis. The videos and practices shared the following themes: realizations of on-platform value, tactics oriented against platform logics and monetization programs, shared theories of value, and digital collaboration for a cause. We argue the genres constitute forms of algorithmic mutual aid, a practice unfolding in platform economies that demonstrates people’s increased recognition of the value of their digital labor, and efforts to reorient platform logics of value, visibility, and compensation to care for one another.