TikTok stopped being just a short-video app long ago. Quietly but systematically, the Chinese platform is turning into a "super-app" - an ecosystem in which the user books a hotel, takes out a loan, pays and shops, without ever leaving the app. The figure that tells the scale: 15.8 billion dollars in sales.

The model isn't new - China's WeChat established it years ago, merging messages, payments, services and commerce into one single app. TikTok is now following the same path in Western markets, adding layer after layer: an online store, a payment system, bookings, even financial products like loans.

The logic behind this is simple and powerful. The more time a user spends in one app, the more data it collects - and the more chances it has to sell them something. TikTok already knows what you watch, what keeps you there, what makes you scroll late into the night. Now it wants to know what you buy, where you travel, and how much money you borrow.

Here's the worrying part. When one app knows everything about you - your habits, your desires, your finances - and at the same time sells you everything, the line between service and manipulation becomes blurred. The algorithm that keeps you glued to the screen is the same one that recommends what to buy. Are you really deciding, or has the decision already been made for you?

For users in the Balkans, who increasingly embrace these platforms, the question isn't academic. Super-apps bring convenience - everything in one place - but also a concentration of power the world has rarely seen. One company, with access to your videos, your money and your habits. Convenience has a price, and that price is usually paid in data.