I recently made a video on my TikTok that didn’t really go anywhere at first it had around 340 likes, which is pretty normal. Nothing viral, nothing crazy. But then I decided to test something: I paid $8 to boost it.
Within seconds, my video was “under review,” but honestly, it barely felt like anything was actually being checked. It went through super fast, and not long after, my views started going up. Within just 10 minutes, I had already gained about 300 more views and it’s still growing. That’s when it really hit me how much of what we see online is actually real, and how much of it is just.. boosted?
This made me question how platforms like TikTok really monitor content. If something can get pushed out to more people just because someone paid for it, does that mean it’s being properly fact-checked? Or is it just being approved because it follows basic guidelines?
The truth is, when people see a video with a lot of views, they automatically assume it’s credible. It looks popular, so it must be true, right? But that’s not always the case. A video could be completely made up, AI-generated, or just misleading—but if it gets enough traction, people start believing it anyway.
We’ve seen this happen before. During the COVID-19 pandemic, videos with false health advice spread quickly because they looked popular and convincing. People trusted them because of the number of views, not because they were actually accurate. The same thing can happen now with AI-generated videos—someone can create something that looks real, boost it, and suddenly thousands of people believe something that never even happened.
Another example is when old videos get reposted as if they’re current events. A clip from years ago can be boosted and shared, and people think it’s happening right now. It spreads fast, and by the time anyone realizes it’s outdated, the misinformation has already reached tons of people.
Even things like product reviews or “life hacks” can be misleading. If a video is boosted and gets a lot of engagement, people assume the product works or the advice is legit without questioning it. The views make it feel trustworthy, even when it’s not.
That’s the scary part. Views don’t equal truth, but on social media, they kind of feel like they do.
This experiment made me realize how easy it is to influence what people see and even what they believe. If something goes viral, most people don’t stop to question how it got there they just watch, like, and share.
So now I’m thinking: are we really in control of what we see online, or are we just being shown what someone paid for us to see?