Gauff writes 'RIP TikTok USA' on a TV camera at Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — American tennis star Coco Gauff mourned the loss of TikTok's app back home, writing on a TV camera lens “RIP TikTok USA” and drawing a broken heart right after winning a match at the Australian Open to reach the quarterfinals.

Gauff's 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 victory over Belinda Bencic in the Grand Slam tournament's main stadium finished on Sunday afternoon local time in Melbourne — about an hour after TikTok could no longer be found on prominent app stores on Saturday in the United States.

“I could not access it after my match. I honestly thought I would be able to get away with it because I was in Australia,” Gauff said at her news conference. “Hopefully it comes back. ... It’s really sad. I’ve been on the app since it was called Musical.ly. I love TikTok. It’s like an escape. I honestly do that before matches. I guess it will force me to read books more — be more of a productive human, probably. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise."

Tennis players at many tournaments often are handed a pen after a win so they can deliver whatever thoughts they want via the lens of a courtside camera. In this case, Gauff paused a bit to think and said, “I think I'm going to go with this one,” before offering her TikTok message in blue ink.

At the French Open in June 2022, after reaching her first Grand Slam final as a teenager, Gauff referred to a recent spate of mass shootings in the U.S. at the time and wrote in marker: “Peace. End gun violence.”

Now 20, Gauff is one of the top players in her sport. She won the 2023 U.S. Open and is currently ranked No. 3.

Gauff frequently has posted on TikTok, often mimicking popular trends.

“I feel this is the third or fourth time this has happened. This time it’s just like, ‘Whatever.’ If I wake up and it doesn’t work, fine. I’m done wasting my time figuring it out,” Gauff said earlier during the Australian Open. “I see there’s a new app called RedNote that a lot of people are migrating over to. So I feel, regardless, people are going to be fine because people are always going to migrate to another app.”

She added that she hoped TikTok would survive, calling it “a great thing for a lot of small businesses in our country, and a lot of creators make money on it and have the chance to spread stories. Personally, me, a lot of great stories I’ve heard are from TikTok and connecting with people has been (through) TikTok. I hope it will stay, (but) obviously I don’t know all the security issues and things like that.”

The company’s app was removed from prominent app stores, including the ones operated by Apple and Google, while its website told users that the short-form video platform was no longer available. The blackout began just hours before a U.S. federal law banning TikTok was scheduled to go into effect.

Apple and Google app stores were prohibited from offering TikTok under the law that required its China-based parent company, ByteDance, to sell the platform or face a ban in the U.S.

“I heard about that,” No. 1-ranked Aryna Sabalenka, a Belarusian who is the two-time defending champion in Melbourne, said after her victory Sunday. “This is not something we can control, and I hope they’re going to figure it out, because I love TikTok.”

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AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis