Welcome to the Thursday edition of Internet Insider, exploring the crosshairs of online and offline identities.
BREAK THE INTERNET
‘Which Black Mirror episode is this?’: @Homecoming.diary’s entrancing, high-tech TikTok videos are a mystery
What does a single woman do after she gets home from work? Or from a date? What about after a party? Or after skateboard training?
These are the types of questions that @homecoming.diary, a TikTok account with almost 2 million followers, poses at the beginning of a majority of its viral videos. What follows is usually a fast-paced, edited sequence of hyper-specific gadgets, inexplicable chores, and the usage of multiple mini washing machines. But the purpose of the videos is unclear. They aren’t explicit advertisements—but they aren’t depicting real life, either. They’re a genre all their own.
In one of @homecoming.diary’s recent TikToks, the video’s inaugural question is “What does a girl with a monthly salary of $100,000 do after work on a Saturday?” The TikTok begins as many of @homecoming.diary do: A woman, who looks to be in her 20s, walks up the stairs to her apartment where it’s snowing—indoors.
Highlights from the rest of the video include the woman making mini pies in a toaster oven, squeegeeing her counter with a small tool shaped like a cloud, drying her hands on a shag-style towel with a dragon’s face on it, and using multiple mini garbage cans, each one smaller than the rest.
“Why am I so obsessed with these videos,” commented @theselfhelpplanner.
In addition to the widespread bafflement in response to @homecoming.diary’s videos, some TikTokers think the account’s videos are advertisements for the products shown.
But @homecoming.diary doesn’t have any other social media accounts or retail websites linked in its TikTok bio and did not immediately respond to the Daily Dot’s request for comment via TikTok comment.
—Tricia Crimmins, Staff Writer
MUST-READS
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‘They were bombarding, bum-rushing us, and I threatened to call the police.’
TikToker says he played the Sims on now-ex-boyfriend’s computer—and found Black Sims chained up
‘That’s actually deranged.’
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‘How did he even have the time for all this?’
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TIKTOK OF THE DAY
A Starbucks barista’s TikTok has gone viral after sharing her interaction with a customer who didn’t “get how coffee works.”
VIRAL FAILS
TikToker accidentally submits recording of herself practicing for job interview in viral video
A viral TikTok captures the moment a SkyWest Airlines job applicant realizes she accidentally recorded herself practicing for a one-time-only video interview.
User Chaylene Martinez (@chayjordan_) said she was applying for a flight attendant job at SkyWest airlines and started recording too early while filming her video interview, which apparently applicants only get one take to complete. Her TikTok video has received over 4.1 million views and 438,600 likes since she posted it on Jan. 27.
Captioned, “Def not getting the job. Sorry SkyWest,” the video shows Martinez filming her failed video interview application.
Text layovers narrate the video and express the TikToker’s reactions as she looks back on it.
“Doing a video interview that you only get right… accidentally started recording too early,” begins the narration. It’s immediately apparent that Martinez is unaware that the camera is recording.
“This is the stupidest cheesiest question I’ve ever read in my life,” an oblivious Martinez says.
She goes on to practice answering the question multiple times before realizing the entire practice round was being recorded, at which point she freezes and looks shocked.
“Oh no!” she says. “I’m so sorry I didn’t realize it was recording. I was practicing. Sorry.” She then ends the video recording.
—Clara Wang
Now Playing: 🎶 “Pressure” by Ari Lennox 🎶