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One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

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Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#71

Post by htrp »

criddell wrote: post #64
wanda wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be so hasty to call time of death on the internet. We are all of us here discussing this matter, after all. More significantly, controlling the narrative is not new. The Cold War was a narrative war, each side warning their citizens of the dangers of the other, and that even the ideas from across the seas were virulent and treasonous. World War II was a war that featured a huge amount of propaganda, and wh…

> I wouldn't be so hasty to call time of death on the internet. We are all of us here discussing this matter, after all. What has died is the idea of the internet. It is thoroughly balkanized now. We're here on this internet talking. Things are different on other internets.

>What has died is the idea of the internet. It is thoroughly balkanized now.

The original design was that individual state level actors couldn't sever access to the internet without significant investment.....

We just balkanized the internet in a different direction (walled gardens)

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#72

Post by htrp »

antattack wrote: post #48
karencarits wrote: post #3

I like the systematic approach they have used, and am a bit scared by the results. In one way, it is not that surprising that a social media app is so tightly controlled and used as a tool by the Russian government to hide unpleasant parts of reality. But I think it is a bit surprising that TikTok hasn't met more criticism and resistance on this

It's a social media app. No one should expect news or hard facts from tik-tok. With that said - it would interesting so see what tik-tok looks like in China. Based on reports, Russian invasion is also heavily censored in China[0] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jf55gMvwc00

Except for a certain demographic (somewhere around 22 and under), TikTok is news, entertainment, TV, and Socialization

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#73

Post by Joeri »

dotancohen wrote: post #38
toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

The threat that you're modeling against is not a threat to the internet. The internet is a group of technologies enabling near-realtime dissemination of information. It has no implicit promise of freedom of speech or press, democracy, or any other political ideal. Even the World Wide Web has no such implicit promise. The great democratizing force to which you refer is the ability to publish content, and to an extent…

Like the zen koan, does a piece of information exist of no one is around to read it? Self-hosting is mostly pointless because the problem is the walled gardens trapping global attention. Many people barely see a browser window, and consume all online information inside the walled gardens. Whether you publish outside that garden or not it is effectively the same, because they will never see what you write.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#74

Post by Zambyte »

jmiskovic wrote: post #29
toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

Internet is a bit larger than TikTok and some other social networks. Wikipedia, Internet Archive, even the Reddit for all its issues, are still living examples of great democratizing force.

All three of those are centralized authoritative forces. Mediawiki (distinct from Wikipedia), Mastodon, Pleroma, Peertube, Lemmy, Owncast, etc. are better examples of democratizing forces on the internet.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#75

Post by krapp »

htrp wrote: post #71
criddell wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wouldn't be so hasty to call time of death on the internet. We are all of us here discussing this matter, after all. What has died is the idea of the internet. It is thoroughly balkanized now. We're here on this internet talking. Things are different on other internets.

>What has died is the idea of the internet. It is thoroughly balkanized now. The original design was that individual state level actors couldn't sever access to the internet without significant investment..... We just balkanized the internet in a different direction (walled gardens)

We balkanized platforms on the internet. It does still take significant investment to balkanize the entire internet.

Platforms on the internet are not the internet, as much as people like to conflate them for the sake of the narrative.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#76

Post by tempodox »

criddell wrote: post #58
tempodox wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exercising your freedom would start by not using such a closed platform where you have no control over the content you provide and are subject to arbitrary rules.

What do you mean by "have no control over the content you provide"?

Things like retaining ownership/copyright to said content, determining yourself who gets to see it (probably everyone, but maybe not), the ability to delete the content, etc…

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#77

Post by pydry »

dotancohen wrote: post #38
toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

The threat that you're modeling against is not a threat to the internet. The internet is a group of technologies enabling near-realtime dissemination of information. It has no implicit promise of freedom of speech or press, democracy, or any other political ideal. Even the World Wide Web has no such implicit promise. The great democratizing force to which you refer is the ability to publish content, and to an extent…

My great hope in the early 2000s was that all you had to do was provide a route for information and the effect of propaganda would crumble once people had access to the truth. And, the internet did provide the route that did not exist before it just didnt matter.

Truth is that people largely place trust in institutions and people they are used to and identify with, often for irrational reasons. People are prone to FUD. Theyre lazy and passive.

This means that, for example, Rupert Murdoch has a disproportionate level of political influence in the UK because he dominates media through which people watch and read about sports.

And Tiktok is an effective propaganda delivery channel because it already feeds kids videos of dances they like.

Sadly, programming people on a mass scale is just as effective as it ever was because it turned out how trust is acquired mattered way more than mere access to information.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#78

Post by toxik »

ajsnigrutin wrote: post #56
toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

Yep... Putin blocking media ... sure... dictators block stuff all the time. EU blocking RT.com (and a few others) was quite a shock for me,... really a thing that should not be happening in EU (no matter whose propaganda it is).

Agreed, I was also surprised that the EU would do the very thing that is supposed to set it apart: media censorship.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#79

Post by cybdestroyer »

toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

Had to sign in to visibly laugh at this comment. Democracy is dead b/c TikTok is the most childish opinion you could post about this topic.

Edit: as others pointed out TikTok =! Internet.

Re: One App – Two Worlds: This Is TikTok in Russia and Ukraine

#80

Post by snek_case »

GuB-42 wrote: post #67
toxik wrote: post #24

The dream of the internet as some sort of great democratizing force is already dead and buried, but for any who still believes, this must surely be the final nail in that coffin. Controlling the narrative is only a problem for existing democracies with press freedom. All bets are off once the threat model includes control of the media. So cherish your freedom of speech, and exercise and defend it. I don’t know what t…

This is TikTok, it is not a platform for freedom of speech or whatever. It is a platform to see cute dance videos and more generally a happy place to waste time. For that I'd say that the Russian TikTok is more in like with what TikTok is for and that's the Ukrainian TikTok that is unusual. I guess that you can't avoid it when there is a war in your country, despite all the efforts TikTok makes to keep things carefre…

TikTok has a lot of CCP propaganda in it (fake influencers paid by the CCP). It's not just a happy place to see cute dance videos.

This goes into some of said propaganda in it, and how they have more "soft" propaganda in the US version of TikTok vs more intense propaganda in the Chinese version of the app: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aYCG4vEe5s

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