On a random Tuesday in January, Maia Driz-Diaz ‘22 woke up after a long week of Zoom fatigue to the sound of her phone continuously buzzing. She turned over her left shoulder to reach for her phone on her bedside table just to see it swelling with a plethora of text messages and notifications from TikTok.  

She opened a text message from her friend: “How did your TikTok blow up?” Confused, she immediately switched over to the TikTok app just to see that her most recent video had just hit 314,900 views. 

The 15-second TikTok features Driz-Diaz duetting with dancer Brandon Ramon, aka @bgottfanns. (A duet is a type of split-screen reaction video.) Ramon has 525,700 followers and 10 million likes. 

“I saw the dance the morning it was posted, and I had never seen this guy before on my For You page. People were already raving about this dance, and I was like, ‘This is such a cool dance; I have to do it.’ So I did it,” Driz-Diaz said.“It was something that I did when I was bored and in my pajamas. And now it is completely blown up.” 

Her new TikTok fame has had some advantages.  

“I was at 2,000 followers when I posted it, and after it went viral I was up at 3,000 followers from one video, which is surprising because it wasn’t anything that I put a lot of effort into,” Driz-Diaz said. “It’s one of those things where getting TikTok famous was not a particular goal of mine, but it still was really fun to watch it blow up.”

Driz-Diaz claims that her video going viral was all just luck of the draw. 

“All I did was hashtag ‘duet,’ and that was it. I feel like it is so random with TikTok if your post is gonna go viral or not. I one hundred percent did not expect it to blow up as much as it did,” Driz-Diaz said. 

Friend Lina Urquiza ’22 believes the reason for Driz-Diaz’s TikTok fame is the lively personality she portrays through her TikToks. 

“Honestly, I wasn’t surprised that it blew up. She is a very lovable person, not to mention she is absolutely gorgeous. I haven’t looked at the comments or anything, but it didn’t really surprise me because we’ve always joked about how many TikToks it would take to get her famous,” Urquiza said.  

Although Driz-Diaz has enjoyed her time in the spotlight, she doesn’t plan on putting any pressure on herself.

“I honestly plan to keep making TikToks for fun with my friends. I love making them in my free time and enjoy how creative I can get with them. I’ve been posting more casually since I went viral. I don’t really feel any pressure because I do it more for fun,” Driz-Diaz said.