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ytj?Ff)e 3F:p/uN8N)ρas_Zi @EKJs/'/3 s{~w:<2KKR@]vi~`-anEsO 22Y^hҺʱ?;?PrnNEW YORK , Dec. 13, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Report with market evolution powered by AI - The global online gambling market size is estimated to grow by USD 181.47 billion from 2024 to 2028, according to Technavio. The market is estimated to grow at a CAGR of over 11.96% during the forecast period. The report provides a comprehensive forecast of key segments below- Segmentation Overview 1.1 Desktop 1.2 Mobile 2.1 Lottery 2.2 Betting 2.3 Casino 3.1 North America 3.2 APAC 3.3 Europe 3.4 South America 3.5 Middle East and Africa Get a glance at the market contribution of rest of the segments - Download a FREE Sample Report in minutes! 1.1 Fastest growing segment: The desktop segment holds a substantial share in the global online gambling market, providing a convenient platform for users to enjoy various forms of betting and gaming. Desktop devices, including personal computers and laptops, offer advanced capabilities and expansive interfaces for accessing virtual casinos , sports betting platforms, poker rooms, and other online gambling services. Notable online casinos like 888 Casino and Betway provide feature-rich desktop platforms with a diverse range of games, such as slots, roulette, and blackjack, along with live dealer options. Desktop devices' enhanced processing capabilities are crucial for high-stakes activities like live sports betting , where real-time data and video feeds are essential for informed decisions. The desktop segment caters to users seeking a comprehensive gambling experience, offering expansive lobbies, advanced graphics, and interactive interfaces. Desktop-specific promotions and loyalty programs incentivize continued engagement from users, providing exclusive bonuses, specialized tournaments, and targeted rewards based on desktop-specific gameplay metrics. These advantages position the desktop segment for growth in the global online gambling market. Analyst Review The online gambling market has experienced significant growth in recent years, with many consumers turning to the convenience and accessibility of playing casino games, slots, and poker from the comfort of their own homes. In countries like Great Britain , the popularity of online gambling continues to rise. The market includes various platforms offering various games, such as OpenSports for sports betting and Betway for casino and poker. Virtual Reality (VR) technology is also making waves in the industry, with companies like Bet365 and Entain PLC experimenting with gaming experiences. Payment options like Neteller have simplified transactions, while sponsorships with organizations like the Argentine Football Association and FIFA World Cup add credibility. Films have also played a role in popularizing online gambling , showcasing the excitement and potential winnings. Regardless, responsible gambling practices are essential to ensure a safe and enjoyable experience for all players. Market Overview Online gambling has seen significant growth in recent years, with land-based casinos facing increasing competition from the digital world. Casino gambling , including slots, poker, and sports betting , has become more accessible than ever before, thanks to advancements in technology. Great Britain is a major market for online gambling , with companies like Kindred, GAME, and Betway leading the charge. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and user experience are key focus areas, ensuring convenient payment options and personalized experiences for players. Virtual and augmented reality are also transforming the industry, with Bet365 and Flutter Entertainment PLC at the forefront. However, concerns around mental health, pathological gambling , and chronic stress remain, with sponsorships and gambling bans a contentious issue. Blockchain and online payment solutions like Neteller are revolutionizing transactions, while product innovations from Betsson AB, Gaming Realms, and others continue to push the boundaries. The FIFA World Cup, European Championships, and major sports leagues like the Argentine Football Association and SA20 are popular betting events, while films and television programs add to the entertainment value. Mobile gambling , fueled by smartphones, is a growing trend, with Iowa's Casino Queen Marquette and other land-based casinos exploring digital opportunities. Internet technology and digital gambling continue to attract internet users in their millions, making it an exciting and dynamic industry to watch. To understand more about this market- Download a FREE Sample Report in minutes! Key Topics Covered: 1 Executive Summary 2 Market Landscape 3 Market Sizing 4 Historic Market Size 5 Five Forces Analysis 6 Market Segmentation 7 Customer Landscape 8 Geographic Landscape 9 Drivers, Challenges, and Trends 10 Venodr Landscape 11 Vendor Analysis 12 Appendix About Technavio Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio's report library consists of more than 17,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio's comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. Contacts Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 Email: [email protected] Website: www.technavio.com/ SOURCE TechnavioTEMPE, Ariz. (AP) — Caleb McCullough was there for the dark times at Arizona State, when the losses piled up and the cloud of an NCAA investigation was hovering over the program. The senior linebacker opted to stick around, believing in coach Kenny Dillingham's vision for a better future. It came sooner than anyone outside the program expected. "I’m doing whatever I can to win,” McCullough said. “I’m not really a stat player. This is my last year of college and my main goal is just to win.” The Sun Devils are doing just that, becoming one of college football's biggest surprises along the way. Picked to finish last in its first Big 12 season, Arizona State (8-2, 5-2 Big 12) now controls its destiny for a spot in the conference title game. The 21st-ranked Sun Devils have already clinched their first bowl berth since 2021, the year they were last ranked in the AP Top 25 before this week. Arizona State has taken down two ranked teams this season, 27-19 over then-No. 16 Utah on Oct. 11 and 24-14 at then-No. 20 Kansas State last weekend. The Sun Devils will play their biggest home game in recent memory against No. 14 BYU on Saturday , the first home game between ranked teams in Tempe since 2014. Beat the Cougars and Arizona State can clinch a spot in the Big 12 Championship on Dec. 7 in Arlington, Texas, with a win over rival Arizona in the regular-season finale. “It means a lot to these guys to come in here with that chip on their shoulder and do something that really nobody thought we could do,” Dillingham said. Arizona State faced adversity on and off the field when Dillingham arrived in 2023. After winning eight games in 2021, the Sun Devils went 3-9 the following year while under investigation by the NCAA, a combination that led to the firing of Herm Edwards during his fifth season here. Dillingham had success as Oregon's offensive coordinator and brought the requisite enthusiasm of being a young — he was 32 at the time — first-time head coach returning to his alma mater. Despite rallying the community around the program, Dillingham fell into hard luck his first season in the desert. The Sun Devils were decimated by injuries, particularly at quarterback, and never recovered, finishing 3-9 for the second straight season. But Dillingham had the pieces in place. He proved to be adept at finding the right players through the transfer portal, landing former Sacramento State running back Cam Skattebo two years ago and former Michigan State quarterback Sam Leavitt prior to this season. The hard-running Skattebo has been one of the nation's best running backs and Leavitt has been a perfect fit for Arizona State's offense, making good decisions while extending plays with his legs. The portal success extends across Arizona State's roster and Dillingham has sprinkled in solid recruiting classes while convincing key players to remain, a combination that's meshed into a team that could crash the College Football Playoff if the pieces fall just right. “We were a three-win team twice,” Dillingham said. “We were under NCAA sanctions. Most head coaches, to be brutally honest, get fired if you take a job under sanctions. You don’t survive. You’re hired to be fired. That’s the nature of the beast and right now we’re sitting here at 8-2, and I couldn’t be prouder." Dillingham's vision for a better future, one the rest of the country didn't see coming, is here and now. AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-footballFounders of 28 Indian new-age startups took home Rs 284 crore as salary in FY24 NEW DELHI: A total of 51 founders of 28 Indian new-age startup companies in the country took home Rs 283.5 crore as an annual salary in FY24. According to the Inc42 report, “The average salary of startup founders in India declined by 26.9 per cent on year-on-year (YoY) basis to Rs 5.55 crore in FY 24 from Rs 7.6 crore in FY23.” These new-age startups are from across all sectors. Among all these startups, Supam Maheshwari, founder of e-commerce startup FirstCry, took home the highest salary of Rs 103.8 crore in FY24. However, this is about 50 per cent less than the salary of Rs 200.7 crore taken in FY23. FirstCry’s operating income in FY24 was Rs 6,480 crore and the company suffered a loss of Rs 321.5 crore during this period. Zerodha founders Nikhil and Nithin Kamath were second on this list in FY24. Each of the two brothers took an annual salary of Rs 33.8 crore in the last financial year. In FY23, each took a salary of Rs 48 crore. Zerodha’s operating income in FY24 was Rs 9,372.1 crore and the company made a profit of Rs 5,496.3 crore during this period. Capillary Technologies founder Aneesh Reddy was third on this list. He took a salary of Rs 13.3 crore in FY24. This is 1,480 per cent more than the salary of Rs 84 lakh in FY23. Hotel software company RateGain founder Bhanu Chopra received a salary of Rs 5.8 crore in FY24 from Rs 6.1 crore in FY23. RateGain’s operating income grew 69 per cent to Rs 957 crore in FY24 and the company posted a profit of Rs 146.3 crore during this period. Paytm, MD and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma were fifth on the list. He took an annual salary of Rs 4.4 crore in FY24, up 10 per cent from the annual salary of Rs 4 crore taken in FY23. Mamaearth CEO Varun Alagh’s annual salary in FY24 was Rs 3.97 crore, up 166.9 per cent from the annual salary of Rs 1.49 crore in FY23. At the same time, his wife and co-founder of the startup received a salary of Rs 1.79 crore in FY24, which is 80.8 per cent more than Rs 99 lakh in FY23. Mamaearth’s operating income in FY24 was Rs 1,919.9 crore and the company made a profit of Rs 110.5 crore during this period. Agencies
Pick a social media platform and a fishing-related hashtag, say #patroutfishing on Instagram . It’ll turn up thousands upon thousands of posts. Anglers have long posed for photos with their latest and biggest catches, but the phenomenon of being able to pull out a smartphone and share your achievement globally is unique to the past 10 or 15 years. It’s something that’s been on Travis Pantaleo’s mind since the coronavirus pandemic drove so many of us into nature for socially isolated recreation — and it was the focus of his master’s research thesis in fisheries management at Oregon State University. Wednesday night, he brought his look into “Fish Out of Water” to Lost Tavern Brewing in Hellertown, as part of the Watershed Coalition of the Lehigh Valley’s Tap Talk series. “What impact, if any, does the use of social media have on recreational angling from a catch-and-release or even a mortality perspective?” is the question he posed. “And the reason that this is important is because some of your most dedicated anglers will do everything that they absolutely can to make sure that a fish swims off. But there’s still a 10% mortality assigned to any catch-and-release angling ... .” Travis Pantaleo, a member of the Cooks Creek Watershed Association in Bucks County and the Board of Directors for the Watershed Coalition of the Lehigh Valley, discusses catch-and-release fishing and snapping fish photos for social media during a coalition Tap Talk on Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, at Lost Tavern Brewing in Hellertown. Kurt Bresswein | For lehighvalleylive.com Numerous managers of fisheries across the United States offer tips — online, of course — on how to practice safe catch and release. The intersection of the internet and fishing isn’t necessarily a bad thing, Pantaleo said. Anglers can visit the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission’s GIS site for maps of trout streams; where-and-when details on the 4.4 million trout stocked this year in Pennsylvania, including 1.2 million stocked by cooperative nurseries that help raise trout for anglers to go out and catch; and more. Those who manage fishing can draw on information gleaned from social media to influence decision making on stocking and conservation, he said. Pantaleo admits to taking photos of some of the fish he catches while out on Cooks Creek in Upper Bucks or other local steams. But his research has shown the extra time to snap a shot can increase the risk to the fish. “When you go to take a photo, the chances are the percentage and times that you’re keeping that fish out of the water multiplies by 1.6,” he cited. “So keeping a fish out for 30 seconds just became 45. Keeping a fish out of water for 60 seconds just became a minute and a half. “And so it kind of extrapolates the possibility of harming that fish without even really thinking about it. And when you see a lot of photos online, they look pretty good. You know, if you’re anything like me, if you go take a picture of a fish, you’re rushing. Like for me it’s quick, it’s awful because the photo comes out really bad because I’m just trying to get it back in the water and I’m not a good photographer.” Pantaleo is a member of the Cooks Creek Watershed Association and a board member at the Watershed Coalition of the Lehigh Valley, a nonprofit organization that encompasses 13 waterway groups in all. His research shows that the time a fish spends out of water, assuming it’s being released, can cause serious damage. “It’s not too different from if you were to try to hold your breath under the water for 60 seconds or more,” he said. “The only thing is where we would asphyxiate because we would take in too much water, fish kind of have the opposite: They have a large buildup of carbon dioxide. When they’re reintroduced into the water, to put it simply, the oxygen moves through their body so fast that it causes cardiac issues.” That sudden exchange can kill a fish, or cause difficulty righting or balancing itself, or lead to reproductive problems, Pantaleo said, voicing particular concern for native populations of brook or brown trout. “There can be injury to the fish,” Pantaleo said. “So depending on how you hook it, if you hook a fish relatively deep inside of its throat with its gills, there’s a good chance it’s going to swim away bleeding and ultimately die from loss of blood. You can scrape it, it can get infected.” Some examples of best practices for catch-and-release fishing include using barbless hooks, going with a silicone or rubber-mesh net instead of nets with knots, and wetting hands or gloves to reduce harm to the protective slime covering the fish’s skin. Anglers are good partners in conservation, said Stefanie Green, who coordinates the Watershed Coalition of the Lehigh Valley’s Tap Talk series. Rod and gun clubs promote coalition events. They organize stream cleanups. Pennsylvania’s fishing license sales estimated at 782,989 in 2023-24 help protect native species, conserve the outdoors and enhance waterways , according to Fish and Boat. Pantaleo cited examples of anglers calling others out on social media, over pics of fish that have been dropped or which are covered in dust or dirt. “And on the opposite side of that, you have other forums where people are very encouraging of folks to go out and experience this type of experience for themselves,” he told about 18 people gathered for Wednesday night’s Tap Talk. “So it goes back to that idea that social media can both be a positive and a negative.” The Watershed Coalition started its Tap Talks in spring 2019 at Birthright Brewing Co. in Nazareth. They’re held in conjunction with the Penn State Extension, whose master watershed steward coordinator for Lehigh and Northampton counties, Shannon Frankosky, was in attendance Wednesday. The series grew out of visits to local businesses that use Lehigh Valley water, and the talks don’t always take place at beer breweries. The members have held events at Portch Tea, a kombucha-tea maker in the Emmaus area; Taylor House Brewing Co. and Blocker’s Coffeehouse in Catasauqua; Seven Sirens Brewing Co. in Bethlehem; and Black River Farms Vineyard & Winery in Lower Saucon Township. “Give us something delicious with local water and we’re there,” said Green, who is president of the Bertsch-Hokendauqua-Catasauqua Watershed Association. For more tips on safe catch-and-release fishing, including to keep both the fight and the fish’s time out water as brief as possible, visit the websites of the National Park Service website or National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration . The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife is blunt in its recommendation: “ Photos can be so stressful. SKIP SOCIAL MEDIA! But if you feel you must get a picture, prepare for taking photos with your fish safely under the water surface. When lifting the fish out of the water, do it for 5 second intervals or less. Try to get the shot (within reason), but return your fish to the water for a rest between attempts. Take it slow down below.” More tips from keepfishwet.org include making sure your camera is easily accessible and ready to use and being mindful of conditions where a photo simply isn’t a good idea , like if the water is warm or the fish is deeply hooked. Pennsylvania Fish and Boat also offers a video on “How to Handle Fish for Safe Catch and Release” : Learn more about the Watershed Coalition of the Lehigh Valley on Facebook . Wednesday’s event was free, though participants were asked to register at eventbrite.com . President Rebecca Hayden says its next Tap Talk is planned for January on pollution trapped in snow and its year-round effects on both surface water and groundwater. more lehigh valley outdoors news Red leaves and white veggies, rufous hummers and snowy owls | Lehigh Valley Nature Watch Autumn snow dumps nearly a foot in Poconos, as hunting calendar heats up Pennsylvania lifts bans on permitted fires on state land Deer season preview: Promising prospects await Pennsylvania’s firearms hunters Better care, checkup urged after hunters die of heart attacks while hauling away deer Kurt Bresswein may be reached at kbresswein@lehighvalleylive.com .Article content After seeing his outstanding NHL career seemingly cut short by a series of long-term health issues, Jonathan Toews has revealed the latest details of his “healing journey.” Recommended Videos Toews was forced to step away from the NHL in 2023 due to ongoing health concerns related to long COVID and chronic immune response syndrome. He had previously missed the 2020-21 season due to health issues before returning to the team for the next two seasons. His search to restore his health and wellbeing has apparently taken him to India, where he is using a treatment called a Panchakarma, which is an Ayurvedic detox. “As some of you may know, I’ve been on a bit of a healing journey. I’ve had many ups and downs, brief moments of hope working with a whole bunch of different doctors and modalities, followed by doubting if things would ever improve,” Toews wrote on Instagram. “But I recently spent 5 weeks in India undergoing an Ayurvedic detox called a Panchakarma, and I’m happy to say things are trending. A post shared by Jonathan Toews (@jonathantoews) “Ayurveda translates to ‘Knowledge of Life’ and has been the healing science of India for over 5,000 years. This system views our bodies as delicate ecosystems, influenced by everything we consume as far as energy, information, thoughts, feelings, and food. In short, it teaches that our health can thrive when we learn to simplify our lives, create space for stillness and better align ourselves with nature’s rhythms. “A Panchakarma is a healing protocol designed to restore your health by cleansing and releasing toxins stored deep in the body.” According to the National Library of Medicine in the U.S., Ayurveda “is the traditional medical system of India and, according to the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine at the National Institutes of Health, it is understudied in western contexts.” It also added that “Panchakarma is believed to help cleanse the body of impurities that can lead to disease.” Toews included a carousel of images of himself in India with several others at the clinic, but opted to not go into too much detail of his experience. “It’s too long of a story to share all the details here, but it’s been almost 5 years of searching for a way to heal the inflammatory and immune system issues that took me out of hockey. The wisdom of Ayurveda has taught me that everything I experience, I am responsible for,” he wrote. “Not only did it teach me better diet choices specific to my body type, it has deepened my intuitive relationship with myself and the world around me.” During his time with the Blackhawks, Toews won the Stanley Cup three times and took home the Conn Smythe Trophy in 2009-10. He also won the Frank Selke Trophy in 2013. The 36-year-old native of Winnipeg scored 372 goals and 883 points in 1,067 career games.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) — If the Giants’ franchise-record 10th straight loss proved anything, it’s that New York could use a young franchise quarterback. Rookie Michael Penix Jr. showed what a young QB can do on Sunday against the Giants, who need to learn from it. The No. 8 overall pick in the draft, Penix played a nearly flawless game in his first career start to help the Falcons thrash the woeful Giants 34-7 in their best performance in weeks. The Giants gambled in 2019 that Daniel Jones would be their franchise QB and it really never panned out. The one exception was the 2022 season, when the No. 6 overall pick had a career year and led New York to a 9-7-1 record and a playoff berth in the first season after Joe Schoen was hired as general manager and Brian Daboll was named coach. The Giants even won a playoff game. With the release of Jones last month, the Giants (2-13) are now a team without a quarterback who can perform at the level required of an NFL starter. Tommy DeVito and Drew Lock have split the last four starts but neither has provided much of a spark for the league’s worst offense. Lock handed the Falcons the game with two interceptions that were returned for touchdowns. To turn things around next season, the Giants must find a quarterback. RELATED COVERAGE The Darnold-Jefferson connection is thriving for the surging Vikings Patriots coach Jerod Mayo believes narrow loss to Bills shows potential of his young team Garrett’s comments about his future add wrinkle to Browns’ worst season since 0-16 in 2017 “I’d say it’s very important,” Daboll said Monday. New York is going to have a high pick in the draft in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in late April. It could even be the No. 1 overall selection. Choosing the right quarterback is going to be hard. There isn’t a can’t-miss choice in 2025 draft and forcing one early would be a mistake. Unless the Giants are convinced that Cam Ward, Shedeur Sanders, Jalen Milroe or someone else is the next franchise player, they have have so many needs that it would be better to wheel and deal and fill as many holes as possible. Even if the Giants take a quarterback in the second round, there’s bound to be someone available who has a chance to be better than what they have now. What’s working The calendar. The season ends in less than two weeks. What needs help The franchise is in disarray, and a shakeup appears likely. Daboll’s future as the coach is not bright, considering the current skid and two straight losing seasons. Schoen has to share the blame and so do co-owners John Mara and Steve Tisch, who hired the GM and coach. Stock up LB Darius Muasau. The sixth-round draft pick out of UCLA has started the last three games since Bobby Okereke (back) was hurt and eventually put on injured reserve last week. Muasau had 11 tackles Sunday along with a quarterback hit and a tackle for a loss. He made the defensive calls after LB Micah McFadden left with a neck injury. Stock down Lock. In his starts, Lock has had three interceptions returned for touchdowns. He also lost a fumble on a strip-sack at Atlanta. Lock sustained a shoulder injury during the game and had an MRI on Monday. Injuries Besides Lock and McFadden, S Jason Pinnock (eye) also left the game. C John Michael Schmitz and RB Tyrone Tracy were evaluated for ankle injuries on Monday. Key number 1 — Thanks to the Raiders’ victory over the Jaguars, the Giants will have the No. 1 overall pick in the draft with two more losses. Next steps For the ninth and final time, the Giants will try to find a way to win at MetLife Stadium. New York is 0-8 heading into Sunday’s game against the Indianapolis Colts. Its only other winless season at home was in 1974 when New York played at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut, while Giants Stadium was being built. ___ AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl
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WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawmakers, meet your latest lobbyists: online influencers from TikTok. The platform is once again bringing influencers to Washington, this time to lobby members of Congress to reject a fast-moving bill that would force TikTok's Beijing-based parent company to sell or be banned in the United States. On Tuesday, some influencers began a two-day advocacy event in support of TikTok, which arranged their trip ahead of a House floor vote on the legislation on Wednesday. But unlike a similar lobbying event the company put together last March when talks of a TikTok ban reached a fever pitch, this year’s effort appeared more rushed as the company scrambles to counter the legislation, which advanced rapidly on Capitol Hill. Summer Lucille, a TikTok content creator with 1.4 million followers who is visiting Washington this week, said if TikTok is banned, she “don’t know what it will do” to her business, a plus-sized boutique in Charlotte, North Carolina. “It will be devastating,” Lucille said in an interview arranged by the platform. In an unusual showing of bipartisanship, a House panel unanimously approved the measure last week. President Joe Biden has said he will sign the legislation if lawmakers pass it. But it’s unclear what will happen in the Senate, where several bills aimed at banning TikTok have stalled. The legislation faces other roadblocks. Former president and current presidential candidate Donald Trump, who holds sway over both House and Senate Republicans, has voiced opposition to the bill, saying it would empower Meta-owned Facebook, which he continues to lambast over his 2020 election loss. The bill also faces pushback from some progressive lawmakers in the House as well as civil liberties groups who argue it infringes on the First Amendment. TikTok could be banned if ByteDance, the parent company, doesn’t sell its stakes in the platform and other applications it owns within six months of the bill’s enactment. The fight over the platform takes place as U.S.-China relations have shifted to that of strategic rivalry, especially in areas such as advanced technologies and data security, seen as essential to each country’s economic prowess and national security. The shift, which started during the Trump years and has continued under Biden, has placed restrictions on export of advanced technologies and outflow of U.S. monies to China, as well as access to the U.S. market by certain Chinese businesses. The Biden administration also has cited human rights concerns in blacklisting a number of Chinese companies accused of assisting the state surveillance campaign against ethnic minorities. TikTok isn’t short on lobbyists. Its Beijing-based parent company ByteDance has a strong lobbying apparatus in Washington that includes dozens of lobbyists from well-known consulting and legal firms as well as influential insiders, such as former members of Congress and ex-aides to powerful lawmakers, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will also be in Washington this week and plans to meet with lawmakers, according to a company spokesperson who said Chew’s visit was previously scheduled. But influencers, who have big followings on social media and can share personal stories of how the platform boosted their businesses — or simply gave them a voice — are still perhaps one of the most powerful tools the company has in its arsenal. A TikTok spokesperson said dozens of influencers will attend the two-day event, including some who came last year. The spokesperson did not immediately respond to questions about how many new people would be attending this year’s lobbying blitz. The company is briefing them ahead of meetings with their representatives and media interviews. Lucille, who runs the boutique in North Carolina, says has seen a substantial surge in revenue because of her TikTok page. The 34-year-old began making TikTok content focusing on plus-sized fashion in March 2022, more than a decade after she started her business. She quickly amassed thousands of followers after posting a nine-second video about her boutique. Because of her popularity on the platform, her business has more online exposure and customers, some of whom have visited from as far as Europe. She says she also routinely hears from followers who are finding support through her content about fashion and confidence. JT Laybourne, an influencer who also came to Washington, said he joined TikTok in early 2019 after getting some negative comments on videos he posted on Instagram while singing in the car with his children. Laybourne, who lives in Salt Lake City, Utah, said he was attracted to the short-form video platform because it was easy to create videos that contained music. Like Lucille, he quickly gained traction on the app. He says he also received more support from TikTok users, who reacted positively to content he produced on love and positivity. Laybourne says the community he built on the platform rallied around his family when he had to undergo heart surgery in 2020. Following the surgery, he said he used the platform to help raise $1 million for the American Heart Association in less than two years. His family now run an apparel company that gets most of its traffic from TikTok. “I will fight tooth-and-nail for this app,” he said. But whether the opposition the company is mounting through lobbyists or influencers will be enough to derail the bill is yet to be seen. On Tuesday, House lawmakers received a briefing on national security concerns regarding TikTok from the FBI, Justice Department and intelligence officials. AP Journalist Didi Tang contributed to this report. This story was originally published on March 12, 2024. It was updated on December 23, 2024 to clarify a quote by TikTok content creator Summer Lucille.
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