Chinese media company has bought hugely popular social video app musical.ly for $1 billion. Many people pronounce Musical.ly as "musically". Chinese company is technology giant called Bytedance. company hopes it will become first Chinese social media site to become global brand. The Musical.ly app was started in Shanghai in 2014. It now has 60 million active monthly users. app is very popular with young people. On Musical.ly, users can record and share 15-second to one-minute videos of themselves lip-syncing to popular songs. They can edit videos, make funny faces, change speed, add filters and play videos backwards. People who use the app are called "musers".
Musical.ly is set to become next big thing across social media world. It will probably become part of life for young people, and another thing for them to share on their mobile phones. Bytedance's chief executive Zhang Yiming explained why his company bought social video app. He said: "By integrating Musical.ly's global reach with Bytedance's massive user base in China and key Asian markets, we are creating significant global platform for our content creators and brands to engage with new markets." Bytedance also owns one of world's biggest news apps, called Today's Headlines. This popular news service has 120 million active daily users.
