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As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

economist.com

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Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#41

Post by sudosysgen »

lumost wrote: post #35
crmd wrote: post #28

85% of US teenagers use tiktok. That's 85% of the future generation of US senators, Cabinet members, and Supreme Court justices, of police chiefs, civil rights activists, mayors, CEOs, etc. in their bedrooms right now consuming content curated by, and filming their lives and that of their friends, and uploading the video to data centers, that are controlled by a strategic adversary of the United States. This is, to p…

In what world does it make sense to allow a country who blocks access to their market unrestricted access to the US market? If china is a rival to the US, why do they have one of the most favorable trade deals?

Because it's not true that they have unrestricted access to the US market, see Huawei, ZTE, etc...

And it's not true they have one of the most favourable trade deals, many tariffs are still in effect.

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#42

Post by Ekaros »

djbusby wrote: post #34
birdyrooster wrote: post #4

Eventually something China made had to stick, surprising it took this long really.

A lot of the other Chinese apps were clones. TikTock was a novel improvement to the crap of Twitter and Facebook, etc. And it's algo is(was?) very "good"

One has to wonder why none of the big USA based players don't have as good product? From what I have heard there isn't really anything special with the app itself. Ofc, it has reached the critical mass in creators, but it was there for taking...

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#44

Post by ectopod »

yorwba wrote: post #27
ectopod wrote: post #21

China passed a law a couple of years ago requiring all Chinese companies to give the government live access to their databases. Is TikTok exempt? If not, statements that the government hasn't requested any data are misleading. They don't need to.

TikTok is technically not a Chinese company, so it wouldn't be affected by such a law. But I haven't read the law and don't know how accurate your summary of it is. Do you have a link?

https://harrisbricken.com/chinalawblog/chinas-new-cybersecur...

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#45

Post by okasaki »

rcpt wrote: post #7
mjmsmith wrote: post #6

I”m open to good-faith criticism of TikTok, but “our authoritarians don’t like an app controlled by their authoritarians” isn’t particularly compelling.

"the US and PRC are equally authoritarian" isn't particularly compelling either

Indeed, abortion is legal in China[1], the last time a police officer killed someone was in 2019[2] and their incarceration rate is 5x lower[3].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_China

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera...

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#46

Post by meowtimemania »

crmd wrote: post #28

85% of US teenagers use tiktok. That's 85% of the future generation of US senators, Cabinet members, and Supreme Court justices, of police chiefs, civil rights activists, mayors, CEOs, etc. in their bedrooms right now consuming content curated by, and filming their lives and that of their friends, and uploading the video to data centers, that are controlled by a strategic adversary of the United States. This is, to p…

should be edited to be: 85% of future generation will open tiktok at least once this month

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#47

Post by lumost »

curious_cat_163 wrote: post #16
hunglee2 wrote: post #2

excellent article, surprisingly nuanced and - I think - fair in its analysis. The main fear is not that it is a foreign owned app - after all, most people in the countries all over the world are using foreign owned (US) apps - it is because it is the first non-US app used by US citizens which unnerves both the US government and US commentariat. Whether those fears are justified or not, I suspect US will follow the Ch…

I hope that the US doesn’t ban TikTok. That would be a very bad outcome for the concept of an open internet. I do think more regulation are likely in order. There are some very good arguments for not letting children under a certain age to be allowed on the social media platforms. However, the enforcement of those laws is spotty and is left to parental controls. What we need is an outbreak of social media literacy am…

This is effectively demanding an impossible solution to a present problem.

Asking grade school children to weigh the geopolitical consequences of their cat videos is never going to happen. You’re talking about an age group which is still learning basic literacy.

The solution is regulation, we already regulate children's television programming for this exact reason.

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#48

Post by sudosysgen »

ALittleLight wrote: post #11
drno123 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, since in the last 20 years US invaded Iraq, Afganistan and Lybia while PRC invaded 0 countries.

Authoritarianism is not measured by invasion count.

It can't be used alone, but invasion or not destroying the lives of dozens of millions of people violently for marginal gain is authoritarian and it's the essence of the problem with authoritarianism.

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#49

Post by ravenstine »

mjmsmith wrote: post #24
ravenstine wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one here said that TikTok is more corrosive than Trump or Cruz, and you're the only one who brought up democracy. Speaking of the latter, even a purely democratic society can be authoritarian.

From the article: “TikTok’s growing role as a news platform has sparked fears that, in the words of Ted Cruz, an American senator, it is “a Trojan horse the Chinese Communist Party can use to influence what Americans see, hear and ultimately think”.

Maybe you have the opinion that Ted Cruz's policy is corrosive to democracy (however you define that) and more so than that of TikTok, but neither the article nor anyone in the thread suggested anything contrary. The article is remarkably neutral, considering it's from the Economist. So what is your point? That no one should be concerned about TikTok until the eternal evil of the Republican party has been thoroughly addressed?

Re: As TikTok grows, so does suspicion

#50

Post by meowtimemania »

ectopod wrote: post #21

China passed a law a couple of years ago requiring all Chinese companies to give the government live access to their databases. Is TikTok exempt? If not, statements that the government hasn't requested any data are misleading. They don't need to.

Is there any type of due process for when the Chinese government accesses data? Like do they need some court order? Or can a government official just go browse the databases for fun?
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