Charli d'Amelio's record-breaking TikTok

At just 16 years old Charli d'Amelio is the woman of records: Forbes ranked her as TikTok's second-highest-paid celebrity, Fortune put her in the 40 Under 40 list and today she officially became the TikTok Creator with the most followers ever. D'Amelio has 100 million followers on her profile, a figure never reached before, with a clear distance from the second and third positions, held respectively by the dancer Addison Rae with her 69.9 million followers and the illusionist Zach King who counts instead 52.8 million. 

The record concerns not only D'Amelio but also TikTok itself. For a YouTube channel to gain 100 million followers it took 14 years, while TikTok, as we know it, appeared in the world of social media in 2018 and D'Amelio activated her account in May 2019. The speed of her social fame (along with all the branded commercial ventures of the case) is testimony to how TikTok managed, in a very short time, to radically change social media culture worldwide and create its own group of stars who have profoundly altered the notion of celebrity. 

D'Amelio's expansion won't stop there though. Social media stars, in fact, rarely limit themselves to a single platform, given also the changes to algorithms that could, in the future, penalize them - as well as the not very high gains that the platform offers as they're limited to native ads only and not to merch. This is why D'Amelio immediately began to speculate on her fame: she launched a YouTube channel with her sister, co-signed a collection of sweatshirts with Hollister, a line of nail polishes and make-up, became testimonial of a mobile banking service and also signed an agreement for the publication of a book.