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Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

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Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#51

Post by blfr »

filleduchaos wrote: post #45
blfr wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clearly the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for a decade and needs to be sanctioned! I don't really get the snark. Yes, of course the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for multiple decades up to and including staging coups and sending military personnel. The only reason it's not being sanctioned is because of its massive wealth and power.

My comment was only partly tongue-in-cheek, believe me. Even beyond the obvious physical meddling, yes I really would prefer a world where American companies didn't have a de facto hegemony over the internet[0] though I despair of it becoming a reality any time soon. At the very least I'll settle for a world where more Americans acknowledge the existence of that hegemony instead of thinking of themselves as neutral a…

I, too, dislike American corporate hegemony. I'm absolutely certain though that I would dislike Chinese Communist Party hegemony much more.

So yes, it would be better if Americans weren't meddling around but it's not better if the Chinese are meddling as well. Let's clutch some pearls.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#52

Post by 2arrs2ells »

tmpz22 wrote: post #49
MengerSponge wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness, though, the CEO of Facebook hasn't built a better product in almost two decades. Instead, his company's growth has been based on brilliant (and occasionally very shady) acquisitions.

There was nothing brilliant about buying two obviously successful apps: Instagram and WhatsApp.

I’m not here to defend Zuck, but those acquisitions only look obvious in hindsight. People thought Facebook was insane for paying a billion for a photo sharing app with a tiny team. And while WhatsApp was ubiquitous, it was very under the radar in the US until Facebook paid what seemed like an ungodly sum ($12bn) at the time. Instagram may go down in history as one of the greatest acquisitions of all time.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#53

Post by didibus »

blfr wrote: post #26
staticassertion wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A group of teens purportedly using TikTok to troll the president's rally is not election campaign interference.

Why is it not when Facebook ads purchased by foreigners are considered to be?

They were American?

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#54

Post by simonsarris »

MengerSponge wrote: post #47
KKKKkkkk1 wrote: post #25

You know something is broken when the CEO of Facebook chooses to apply himself to lobbying the government to ban his competitors instead of building a better product.

In fairness, though, the CEO of Facebook hasn't built a better product in almost two decades. Instead, his company's growth has been based on brilliant (and occasionally very shady) acquisitions.

Facebook Marketplace is better than Craigslist. Buyers have a history by default ("On Facebook since 2009" etc) which is nice.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#55

Post by TMWNN »

engineer_22 wrote: post #43
TMWNN wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was wondering about that too. For those claiming that Trump is mad at TikTok[1] because kpop fans on the site sabotaged the Tulsa campaign rally by signing up for (free) tickets, a) How do you know that said sabotage was 100% organic and not something TikTok manipulated its algorithms to encourage? b) Even if said sabotage were 100% organic, does the fact that this was done on a Chinese platform cause concern? c) H…

Wow that's a sobering statistic. If true it means Biden is DOA. Social media wins elections.

>Wow that's a sobering statistic. If true it means Biden is DOA. Social media wins elections.

Trump lost MN in 2016 by 1.5%; the Floyd riots and looting might give the state to him this year (suburban voters generally do not like the idea of half of city they work in being torched, and the police force of said city being disbanded). In 2016 Trump won MN 18-24 year olds by five points (http://www.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls/minnesota/pre...). By contrast, Obama won the same age group in the state by 34 points (http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/MN/president/) over Romney! For 18-29 year olds, Clinton won the age group by three points while Obama won by 30 points!

WI and PA saw similar trends. If Trump wins every other state he won in 2016, he only needs to win one of MN, WI, PA, or MI for reelection.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#56

Post by kleinsch »

MengerSponge wrote: post #47
KKKKkkkk1 wrote: post #25

You know something is broken when the CEO of Facebook chooses to apply himself to lobbying the government to ban his competitors instead of building a better product.

In fairness, though, the CEO of Facebook hasn't built a better product in almost two decades. Instead, his company's growth has been based on brilliant (and occasionally very shady) acquisitions.

And due to the current antitrust concerns, there’s no way FB could buy TikTok.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#58

Post by romanoderoma »

blfr wrote: post #27
filleduchaos wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh good, finally someone who agrees with me that every other country in the world should ban Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and so on because those country's citizens use those platforms and also participate in or sabotage political rallies. Clearly the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for a decade and needs to be sanctioned!

Clearly the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for a decade and needs to be sanctioned! I don't really get the snark. Yes, of course the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for multiple decades up to and including staging coups and sending military personnel. The only reason it's not being sanctioned is because of its massive wealth and power.

> Yes, of course the US has been meddling in elections around the globe for multiple decades up to and including staging coups and sending military personnel

It's true

It was also much more expensive both economically and in terms of human losses

Meddling by wire is unequivocally cheaper and safer.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#59

Post by manquer »

2arrs2ells wrote: post #52
tmpz22 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was nothing brilliant about buying two obviously successful apps: Instagram and WhatsApp.

I’m not here to defend Zuck, but those acquisitions only look obvious in hindsight. People thought Facebook was insane for paying a billion for a photo sharing app with a tiny team. And while WhatsApp was ubiquitous, it was very under the radar in the US until Facebook paid what seemed like an ungodly sum ($12bn) at the time. Instagram may go down in history as one of the greatest acquisitions of all time.

WhatsApp was quoted at $19B . You are right that those two were really smart acquisitions .

While WhatsApp has not really changed all that much since the acquisition, there is very little that is the same between Instagram pre Facebook and now.

Were they worth the 1B and 19B price tag? yes totally, however both could have been done cheaper and earlier. There was lots of discussions with snap before whatsApp. The way occulus($3B) due diligence was handled also does not show give a lot of confidence. Facebook just got their way with sheer amount of money they could spend.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Stoked Washington’s Fears About TikTok

#60

Post by teruakohatu »

tmpz22 wrote: post #49
MengerSponge wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness, though, the CEO of Facebook hasn't built a better product in almost two decades. Instead, his company's growth has been based on brilliant (and occasionally very shady) acquisitions.

There was nothing brilliant about buying two obviously successful apps: Instagram and WhatsApp.

Facebook had a WhatsApp competitor with significant marketshare. It was $12 billion to buy WhatsApp or >$12 billion to crush the competition. In hindsight he made the right move.
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