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Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

businessinsider.com

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Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#381

Post by Zafira »

fqye wrote: post #258

If the US forced ByteDance to sell Tiktok, the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law. If you are worried about data leakage to China, you set rules and law and enforce them. That is what China is doing. They asked Apple and other cloud service provider to store data in China. The US could setup clear rules and regulations about where to put data of US user…

> the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law

The US will continue to shed international credibility so long as we Americans continue to engage and enable mainstream discussion of conspiracy theories and populist applesauce. This Trabant quality excuse of an administration is just a symptom of that.

Honestly, I would not be surprised if the sole reason that this executive order is being banded about is because of TikTok users claiming they helped overinflate turnout expectations for that flameout of a rally in Tulsa.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#382

Post by edoceo »

ptx wrote: post #378
xnx wrote: post #376

It appears as though very few Hacker News commenters have spent any time using Tiktok. It is the only enjoyable, enriching social media service I've ever used. Most everything many of us liked about the old/weird internet is present on Tiktok right now: almost no ads or commercial presense, personal content from real people (not hyper produced productions from influencers and pros), weird content, niche content, orga…

> almost no ads It usually starts out that way with any centralized for-profit communications platform. They wouldn't want to spring the trap before luring you in.

Come into my parlour said the spider to the fly...

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#383

Post by xster »

dodobirdlord wrote: post #367
xster wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't the logical equivalency be for China to strong-arm the NBA to sell ownership to a Chinese company if they want the NBA to continue to be watched by Chinese audience?

> Wouldn't the logical equivalency be for China to strong-arm the NBA to sell ownership to a Chinese company if they want the NBA to continue to be watched by Chinese audience? Indeed. The real equivalent would be when China prohibited AWS from operating datacenters in China, forcing them to instead operate out of Chinese-owned datacenters.

Well no, it's not that complicated.

To make it as illustrative as possible, your example is like the child of an American goes to work in China and China says, if you want to work, you need to use my shovel.

My example is like the child of a Chinese goes to work in America and America says you need to be adopted.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#384

Post by tly_alex »

fqye wrote: post #258

If the US forced ByteDance to sell Tiktok, the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law. If you are worried about data leakage to China, you set rules and law and enforce them. That is what China is doing. They asked Apple and other cloud service provider to store data in China. The US could setup clear rules and regulations about where to put data of US user…

It's extraordinary to see an once open and welcoming governement to become xenophobic and ruleless. In the last 10 years, when things like this happen in other country, you would hear POTUS or media condemn this kind of action by referring to an once sacred word like "law" and "due process".

Just like the double standard on delaying the election, it's ok to delay election due to COVID in US, but it's perfectly fine to condemn other places for doing the same.

It would be very interesting to see how how ppl or historian view this 10 years later.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#385

Post by edoceo »

Zafira wrote: post #381
fqye wrote: post #258

If the US forced ByteDance to sell Tiktok, the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law. If you are worried about data leakage to China, you set rules and law and enforce them. That is what China is doing. They asked Apple and other cloud service provider to store data in China. The US could setup clear rules and regulations about where to put data of US user…

> the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law The US will continue to shed international credibility so long as we Americans continue to engage and enable mainstream discussion of conspiracy theories and populist applesauce. This Trabant quality excuse of an administration is just a symptom of that. Honestly, I would not be surprised if the sole reason that…

"Trabant" was a pleasant surprise - it's an East German car -https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trabant

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#386

Post by thinkloop »

crystaln wrote: post #298
fqye wrote: post #258

If the US forced ByteDance to sell Tiktok, the US would lose its last bit of moral high ground in China, the spirit of free market and rule by law. If you are worried about data leakage to China, you set rules and law and enforce them. That is what China is doing. They asked Apple and other cloud service provider to store data in China. The US could setup clear rules and regulations about where to put data of US user…

You obviously don't have much experience with China. China is an authoritarian state and all companies are subject to secret control by the state, essentially branches of the military. There is no legal recourse or protection from such intervention. The government can mandate spy code be inserted and any data they want. You're well intended here, but ignorant of how China operates. There is literally no way to enforc…

Why do countries, including China, mandate companies use their servers in various cases?

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#387

Post by tomp »

russli1993 wrote: post #222
colordrops wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The analogy would only make sense if black people were a foreign economic and nuclear powerhouse that have been blocking US apps with even more prejudice. Tit for tat restrictions are standard practice with international trade and not evidence of racism.

It would be equivalent if Tiktok is banned in the US and only in the US. But this forced sale of Tiktok would definitely include TikTok's non US business as well. The intention from the U.S. government is to not allow Chinese nationals to own any impactful business or technology not only in the US but internationally. Huawei's case was 5G, tiktok and bytedance is social media. Bytedance is incorporated in the Cayman…

> There is no way Chinese government can force their censorship on to tiktok.

Really?

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-...

> TikTok, the popular Chinese-owned social network, instructs its moderators to censor videos that mention Tiananmen Square, Tibetan independence, or the banned religious group Falun Gong, according to leaked documents detailing the site’s moderation guidelines.

Stop with this propaganda please.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#388

Post by throwaway189262 »

justicezyx wrote: post #354
biggestdecision wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies in China have Party Committees, appointed by the government. These committees have oversight over how the company operates, and how the board is appointed. The Chinese government has a strong direct influence inside Chinese businesses, that isn't present in the rest of the world.

Please give me a link, I haven't heard of such organization recently... Edit: Note that CCP does ensure private firms provide support for employees who are also party member to organize relevant activity. State-owned company obviously has party committee, and except great control on personnel, like kind of a board.

Dude please don't play dumb like this on HN. If people don't give you a link it's because you can find it on the first page of Google.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#389

Post by xster »

eunos wrote: post #356
ericmay wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, probably because that's not what is happening. The US has the right to ban companies from the country (as do other countries). What the US is saying is that the parent company (Bytedance) bust divest Tik Tok or they'll lose access to the US market. Microsoft is interested in it, but it could be a different company buying it. This is different than "you must sell this company to this other company" because the U…

> it'll just get banned from operating in the United States Worse, it cold be put into entity list, permanently removed from app store and play store.

I think this is the real topic to discuss. I think China has been doing very poorly in the past years with all its top companies ultra-distracted by the greed of grabbing fast money from the e-commerce boom but paid no attention to basic infrastructure like chips, OS, CAD/CAE etc. It's all built on sand that can be removed at any moment.

Re: Microsoft is reportedly in talks to buy TikTok's US operations

#390

Post by xster »

nouveaux wrote: post #168
moreorless wrote: post #145

Not a single person seem to think that it is odd that we can simply order a foreign company to sell their business to an American company.

It is not odd at all when the foreign company is one of the largest espionage threats to United States, which is one of the largest markets in the world. Yes, the US government is mulling over the idea of banning TikTok but that is only one of the problems. The immediate problem is that US companies have seriously assessed the security risk. TikTok and China have a credibility problem in the business world. TikTok sh…

> when the foreign company is one of the largest espionage threats to United States

Are you referring to something specific or this is a Bush doctrine sort of thing?

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