NPR.

How would you describe your relationship with TikTok?

Oh, TikTok.

My other Ina is 28.

She's from Washington State and as we're talking, she's sitting at a table piled with stuff.

Stuff that she bought because she saw them on TikTok.

It's all kind of spread out here.

I've got a pair of roller skates.

I've got a pair of pink platform, strappy heels, two forms of body wash, body exfoliant,

perfumes, cable clips, biker shorts, and dress, and matching strips, a handbag.

There's a mannequin head and TikTok shows me a lot of women who make wigs and I thought I was going to be one of those women.

I am not.

I mean, there's still a chance if you ever want to be.

Now you have the head.

This table is like a shrine to the power of TikTok marketing.

Okay, yeah, yeah.

But Maya, what doesn't want us to get the wrong idea, right?

She says she's usually not like a frivolous spender.

I can watch YouTube a bunch not be influenced.

Like, I ignore everything on Instagram.

And yet, why is TikTok so good at making me buy things?

So if you've got a mystery, that's a little bit economic, a little bit business, a little bit mysterious.

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