• TikTok is veering toward a US shutdown after the Supreme Court upheld a divest-or-ban law.
• The app is set to leave app stores and may go dark on Sunday if its owner, ByteDance, doesn't divest.
• TikTok creators and their teams are tired from months of uncertainty, but cautiously hopeful too.

TikTok is in trouble.

The company is set to disappear from US app stores on Sunday due to a divest-or-ban law that requires its owner, ByteDance, to sell the app by January 19 or essentially cease operating in the country. TikTok may stop showing content in the US and "go dark" over the weekend.

For TikTok creators and their teams, ongoing uncertainty around the app's US future has sparked frustration and fatigue.

"We've been dealing with this for months," said Julian Andrews, founder of talent management firm Talentiish. "I just sort of want the situation to be over so we know how to move on."

Some in the talent community are cautiously optimistic that a solution will emerge to save TikTok. President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to try to rescue the app once in office, though his options could be limited.

"So many of us are still holding out hope that it will work out," Barbara Jones, CEO of Outshine Talent, said.

Others aren't holding their breath and are instead focusing on established alternatives, such as Instagram reels and YouTube shorts, as well as challenger apps like Clapper, Flip, and RedNote.

"Many of our clients are making accounts on RedNote and Flip as well as downloading their data from the TikTok app," Jones said. "They are trying to be as prepared as possible."

Creators may be hesitant to commit to new platforms, however, when the advertising dollars are much more reliable on major players like Instagram.

Instagram is, for the most part, the platform of choice among those Business Insider spoke to who are pivoting from TikTok.

Fallen Media, which runs TikTok shows like "What's Poppin? With Davis!" said it will be heavily investing in Instagram reels, for example.

"I have suggested to my clients not to focus on any new platforms and focus on the tried and true," Andrews at Talentiish said.

In the meantime, there's still no clear answer as to what happens this weekend.

"The truth is we don't really know what's going to happen on Sunday, which I think is the crazy part," said Fallen Media CEO Sol Betesh.

Creators are exhausted and devastated to say goodbye to TikTok

As news stories around a TikTok ban swing between good news and legal defeats, some creators have sunk into despair. The Supreme Court loss on Friday hit particularly hard for those whose businesses depend on the app.

"The ruling is truly devastating for me as someone who built their platform starting on TikTok," said Sofia Bella, a TikTok creator with 4.8 million followers. "Losing the majority of my audience is a difficult reality to face, and while I'm doing everything I can to prepare, it's hard not to feel like I'm starting over."

Andrews said the job of talent manager has teetered between acting as a therapist and strategist for the creators they manage.

Some creators are actively fighting against a TikTok ban, including Vitus Spehar, who runs the news account @underthedesknews. Spehar has been covering breaking news and political developments around the divestment. They said Americans should call their senators and other representatives to demand action against the law.

Still, other creators who have experienced burnout from TikTok are welcoming a possible shift if the app goes down.

"Generally, the tone from most internet creators I've spoken to has been entirely apathetic," said Tati Bruening, a TikTok creator with 2.4 million followers. "The pacing of content creation for TikTok was a recipe for burnout."

Building a strategy for doomsday

Even as the creator economy braces for the loss of its favorite corner of the internet, this moment is a lesson for many.

"Stop building brands on social media that other people own," Jennifer Powell, a talent manager who works with creators like Tezza and Ty French, told BI. "This can and will happen again. Start your website, get newsletters going, blogs, use affiliates, turn it into a brand, and own your own little place on the web."

A TikTok ban could also be a gold rush for social media startups as they race to fill the void.

"There's never been a better time to start a creation or curation company," said Em Herrera, a former investor at Slow Ventures who recently founded a firm called Creator Venture Accelerator.

• Alex Ruani used to overeat snacks that weren't nutritious.
• A few changes transformed her relationship with snacking.
• She started eating her meals at the same time each day and getting more sleep.

A nutrition scientist who was hooked on snacks like cookies and potato chips shared how she transformed her relationship with snacking.

Alex Ruani, a diet misinformation researcher at University College London, used to reach for high-fat, high-sugar foods like white chocolate and sugary iced coffees throughout the day.

Once she started, she struggled to stop eating. "Those of us who have this tendency to snack, we cannot stop until the entire pack is empty," she told Business Insider.

Now, Ruani said her relationship with snacks is healthier. She rarely snacks anymore, but when she does feel hungry between meals, she chooses something nutritious.

"It's a great opportunity for you to include more nutrients in your diet, more polyphenols, more fiber," she said.

"Snacking is not a bad thing, just keep an eye on what those snacks are," she said.

Ruani shared the three changes she made that helped.

Redesign your food environment

The first thing Ruani did was remove foods she wanted to stop snacking on. That way, she didn't have to rely on just willpower to resist the temptation.

"Redesign your food environments so they serve you, and they're not against you," she said.

In practice, this meant not buying chocolates and chips, removing them from the suggested items on her online grocery order, and avoiding the tempting aisle at the grocery store.

"I cannot be trusted near those things, so I just let my environment make those decisions for me," Ruani said.

Instead, she kept nutritious snacks such as fruit and nuts in her fridge or on her desk at work.

You're much more likely to eat what's immediately accessible to you, she said.

In a 2015 study published in the journal Society for Public Health Education, 710 households were asked which foods, if any, were displayed on their kitchen counters and what the occupants' heights and weights were. Researchers found that having fruit on display was associated with a lower BMI. While counters that displayed candy, cereal, or soft drinks were associated with higher BMIs.

Eat your meals around the same time every day

In the early part of her career, Ruani would eat at random times. "Some days at 8 p.m., some days at seven, some days at midnight, it was a disaster," she said. Once she started eating at more consistent times, she found that her cravings started to naturally subside.

Whether you stick to three meals a day or another setup, eating them at the same time each day can help regulate your hunger hormones, Ruani said. This, in turn, means you are less likely to crave food between meals.

There's a sector of nutrition science that studies how the circadian rhythm, which is our sleep and awake cycles, appetite signals, and food consumption are all correlated, she said. The body loves routine and predictability, she said, so when these elements are synchronized, it can run more efficiently.

"Let's say your dinner on Monday is at 9 p.m., then on Tuesday at 8 p.m., and then on Wednesday at 10:30 p.m. Your body is a little bit more confused, and that can also influence your hunger hormones, their production, and how they signal satiation to the brain," she said.

Get enough sleep

Going to sleep and waking up around the same time every day also helped Ruani to stop overeating.

"Consistent sleeping hours across the week have been associated with better hunger regulation," she said.

Research suggests that getting poor quality or not enough sleep leads people to consume more calories, mainly from snacking, especially in foods rich in fat and carbs, according to a 2022 review published in Nutrients.

A 2022 study published in JAMA Internal Medicine found that when a group of overweight adults slept 8.5 hours a night instead of their usual 6.5 hours, they ate an average of 270 fewer calories a day than a control group.

• Destanee Aiava wore vintage tennis outfits she found on eBay at the 2025 Australian Open.
• She sported replicas of dresses worn by past champions, including Maria Sharapova and Ana Ivanovic.
• Aiava made it through three rounds of qualifying to earn a spot in the main draw.

If you've been following Week 1 of the 2025 Australian Open, you've probably noticed a lot of the same outfits.

Adidas has its players kitted out in bold red for the first major of the year, known as "The Happy Slam." Many of Nike's athletes, including Aryna Sabalenka and Carlos Alcaraz, are wearing green and yellow.

It's not uncommon for tennis players to wear the same kit throughout the entirety of a tournament due to their endorsement contracts.

But for qualifier Destanee Aiava, who doesn't have a clothing sponsor, her on-court styles were completely up to her — and she chose to pay homage to past champions Maria Sharapova, Caroline Wozniacki, and Ana Ivanovic by wearing their iconic looks from the late 2000s and early 2010s.

She couldn't get the gear through Nike or Adidas, though. Aiava bought the dresses secondhand online.

"I've found them on eBay — for double the price that they were originally for," she told tennis reporter Ben Rothenberg. "But yeah, I just like looking on Depop, Facebook Marketplace, eBay to find the old, vintage outfits that I loved when I was little."

Ranked just inside the top 200, the 24-year-old Australian-Samoan had to battle through three rounds of qualifying rounds to earn a slot in the main draw.

For her first match in qualies, she wore a light pink Nike dress that Sharapova sported at the 2012 US Open.

For round two, Aiava got her hands on a pink and purple number worn by Ana Ivanovic at the 2010 US Open.

She wore a different pink Ivanovic dress for her third-round match, which propelled her into the main draw of the AO.

Heading into the first round of the main draw match, BBC asked Aiava about her outfit choice. She said she'd found one of Facebook: "I might go pick that up. It's only $35, which is a steal."

BBC didn't confirm whether she purchased it. Aiava walked on court in a sky blue Adidas dress previously worn by Caroline Wozniacki at the 2013 US Open, and earned her very first Grand Slam main-draw win. Advancing to the round of 64 earned her $200,000 AUD ($124,280 USD).

"It means that I can bring someone to travel with this year, and I can afford to actually go to all the tournaments that I want to," Aiava said after the comeback victory. "I struggle traveling on my own. The fact that I get to bring my fiancé with me and hopefully one of my family members to the big ones, it makes a world of a difference."

In what would be her last match at the 2025 Australian Open, Aiava wore another Sharapova number while battling American Danielle Collins, who eventually prevailed in three sets.

"It was actually from one of the girls that I used to play tennis with when I was little," Aiava told 9News of the fit. "She reached out and offered to lend me a dress and I actually ran out of options as well, so I'm so lucky."

Aiava told BBC that she's "hoping to get a sponsor." But in the meantime, "I'm loving picking whatever I want to wear and buying whatever I want."

She told 9News that if she continues the tradition, she'd like to eventually bring back a Serena Williams piece. However, it was out of her budget for this event: "They are quite hard to find and quite expensive."

• TikTok may go dark Sunday unless Biden ensures the ban won't be enforced.
• The Supreme Court upheld a law requiring TikTok's US operations to be sold by Jan. 19 or face a ban.
• Biden's administration doesn't plan to enforce the ban before Trump takes office.

TikTok said Friday it would be forced to go dark on Sunday, the day the platform ban is set to take effect, unless the Biden administration takes further action to ensure it will not be enforced.

"The statements issued today by both the Biden White House and the Department of Justice have failed to provide the necessary clarity and assurance to the service providers that are integral to maintaining TikTok's availability to over 170 million Americans," TikTok said in a statement posted on X.

"Unless the Biden Administration immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers assuring non-enforcement, unfortunately TikTok will be forced to go dark on January 19," the statement continued.

The statement came after the Supreme Court earlier on Friday upheld the law banning TikTok.

A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

The law, which was passed by Congress and signed by Biden last spring, required TikTok to be banned unless ByteDance, its China-based parent company, sells the app's US operations by January 19.

The law specifically bans US app stores, like Apple's and Google's, from carrying or updating the app. Companies that violate the law could face fines of up to $5,000 per user who accesses TikTok.

The Biden administration said this week it does not plan to enforce the ban since it is set to take effect one day before President Joe Biden leaves office and President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in.

"President Biden's position on TikTok has been clear for months, including since Congress sent a bill in overwhelming, bipartisan fashion to the President's desk: TikTok should remain available to Americans, but simply under American ownership or other ownership that addresses the national security concerns identified by Congress in developing this law," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.

The Justice Department issued a statement on Friday supporting the Supreme Court's decision, adding: "The next phase of this effort — implementing and ensuring compliance with the law after it goes into effect on January 19 — will be a process that plays out over time."

Trump has said he does not support banning TikTok and will work on finding a solution. In a video on Friday, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew thanked Trump for his commitment to saving the app.

On Truth Social, Trump said he had spoken with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the phone and said the call was a "very good one" and that they discussed "balancing Trade, Fentanyl, TikTok, and many other subjects."

It's unclear what TikTok will look like on users' phones come Sunday if the app goes "dark" and whether the video platform's fate in the US will be permanent.

Some workarounds could bring the app back to life, including brokering a deal to sell it to a US buyer.

Figures from Kevin O'Leary of Shark Tank to YouTuber MrBeast have expressed interest in buying the app.

BI's Peter Kafka reported that Bytedance hasn't publicly shown interest in selling TikTok or indicated any progress in a deal with a non-Chinese buyer so far.

There's also the possibility that the Trump administration could issue an executive order reversing the ban under the argument that the move is related to foreign affairs and national security interests.

A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to a request for comment.

• Many modern and popular parenting techniques place a high emphasis on attending to our kids' emotions.
• I give my daughter space when she experiences big emotional outbursts.
• I want her to learn that emotions are passing sensations.

I could see the emotional monsoon coming from a mile away. That's why, as we approached the house, I gently warned my daughter that we would need to take her rainboots off before going inside. She continued splashing through the puddles in our driveway, either unable or unwilling to hear me. Sure enough, when we entered the garage and sat down to take off our shoes, a torrent of tears erupted.

"No, you're NOT taking my boots off!" she screamed. Days earlier, her daycare teacher informed me that she even refused to remove them during naptime.

I briefly considered allowing her to wear the boots inside just to avoid the fight. But glancing down at our muddy footprints only strengthened my resolve.

I breathed in, took her tear-streaked face in my hands, and explained why the boots needed to stay outside. More shrieks. I slipped off her shoes (narrowly avoiding a kick to the face) and carried her thrashing body into the kitchen, where I placed her on the ground. She curled into a ball, threatening to explode again at any moment.

"I love you," I reassured her, patting her back. "I'm sorry we had to take off the boots. We can put them back on later. Right now, I need to cook dinner. Can I give you a hug?"

"NO!" She spat. "I want my boots!" She scrambled back toward the door, slamming her tiny fists against it. "Give me my boots!" she wailed.

Her outburst continued to escalate, but I started making dinner anyway.

I ignored her and carried on with the evening to-dos

Modern parenting philosophies (like gentle parenting) would advise me not to leave her side. These "big emotions" deserve our utmost attention and investigation, according to gentle parenting experts.

Many millennial parents have fallen into this "pendulum parenting" trap. We were raised to suppress our own emotions, so now we're over-correcting that mistake by giving our kids' emotions all the power.

But here's the mistake I think we're making as parents in this gentle parenting era: we need to go beyond identifying the emotion and teach our kids how to move past it.

We need to teach our kids how to move past their emotions

Stopping everything to comfort a child for 45 minutes over something like rainboots or rice crackers does not increase their emotional competence. It's communicating that, despite whatever else is going on, their emotions reign supreme. Nothing and no one else matters; plans get lost in the wake.

Oftentimes (especially when it comes to toddlers), emotions do not represent reality. So, instead of validating our kids' emotions, we validate their outsize reactions to trivial matters. Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a Havard-trained neuroscientist, explains that the physical sensations of emotions pass after 90 seconds. Our feelings persist because we choose to dwell on whatever caused them in the first place. The solution is to acknowledge the emotions and allow them to move through us without continuing to react.

All emotions will pass once I stop giving them my attention

I don't expect my daughter to understand or comprehend what took me years of therapy and practice to figure out. She's only 2, after all. But if I can show her that our emotions don't have all the control, I think it will save her a lot of heartache in the future.

So when a toddler tornado hits, I get out of the way.

After labeling her feelings and offering comfort (if she wants it), I give her time and space to express her emotions in a safe environment. But I don't add fuel to an already-raging fire by giving it more of my own energy and attention. Even the worst storms will eventually pass.

Emotions are a sometimes delightful and sometimes distressing part of the human experience. But they are only one part — there's so much more to life, and the actions that we take in response to our circumstances (and feelings) matter more than anything else.