TikTok, Instagram, and the Death of the Homepage: How Social Discovery Is Replacing Direct Traffic for News.
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Abstract
Nowadays, people use TikTok and Instagram as regular common platforms for daily purposes and for staying updated on news. As a result, the homepage is not used as the main news access point. The study explores how social platforms like TikTok and Instagram are replacing traditional news homepages and are transforming the way people consume news, with a fading reliance on traditional homepages. These shift changes have an impact on the way people discover, engage with, and trust news and are leading to direct visits to news websites. Secondary data was used over a time period from 2000 to 2021, from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Parse.ly, Pew Research Center, Similarweb / Data.ai, eMarketer / Insider Intelligence, and a quantitative methodology, respectively. Longitudinal time series analysis, historical trend measurement, and descriptive statistics analysis are used. The findings indicate a notable rise from 2000 to 2021 of approximately 81% of adults using social media for getting news via direct website from 2000 to 2021, falling to 80%. Average Time Spent on Social Media (min/day) increased from 15 to 115. People's trust in social media news in 2000 was 10%, and in 2021 it was 59%. For primary news adaptation, the application of TikTok, Instagram, and other social media platforms is overtaking traditional homepage visits. This appraise makes news consumption more spontaneous and personalized and requires a rethink of content presentation to sustain relevance in a crowded digital space.
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Publication Details
- Type of Publication:
- Conference Name: nternational Conference on Challenges and Trends in Arts and Social Sciences (ICCTASS 2025).
- Date of Conference: 11/12/2025 - 11/12/2025
- Venue: American International University–Bangladesh, Kuril, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
- Organizer: FASS, AIUB