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U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

reuters.com

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Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#261

Post by 0xffff2 »

ahbyb wrote: post #255
mgraczyk wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard this myth that musical.ly was founded in China before, but it's hard to believe if you look at some basic facts. One cofounder worked full time at SAP in SF bay area for several years before and after musical.ly was founded. The other says on his LinkedIn that he was working in Santa Monica for several years on either side of the founding. They lived, worked, and founded the company in CA.

Alex Zhu and Luyu Yang don't sound very Californian to me.

Really? As both a SoCal and Bay Area resident name alone would tell me absolutely nothing about whether someone was a native to either area.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#262

Post by newguy1234 »

Ar-Curunir wrote: post #130

While I agree that Chinese soft imperialism is bad, I think it's tremendously funny that Americans are complaining about it now, after years of using military and economic power to enforce a similar imperialism everywhere.

Yup, US power is being attacked on all fronts. Just look at how fearful congress was of the Libra cryptocurrency. They were literally talking about libra being a risk to the entire US financial system because libra could blackmail the USA by pulling USD as a reserve backing libra, causing high inflation in the USA. It is no surprise that people/countries/companies are trying to get out of the web we have created around the world (through the financial system). The problem is the USA is imposing all sorts of rules and regulations on foreign countries, threatening their sovereignty. Also the USA is usually extremely militant in how we enforce our rules. Don't comply with the rules - we shut down your accounts, seize your assets etc. Then we require ever financial institution to monitor their customer's activity and report it to authorities. Completely Orwellian system. No wonder people are trying to get out of it.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#263

Post by dinkleberg »

radcon wrote: post #227
nullc wrote: post #207

So HN changed the headline to remove TikTok which is a name I reconized and replaced it with "ByteDance" and "Musical.ly", which I've never heard of before. It was originally displayed on HN the same as it is in the article. From the article, I know that the new headline is more precise. But it's much less informative, I wouldn't have clicked the article under this name.

They also edited a headline for a #1 ranked story about Blizzard and the Hong Kong issue, removing Hong Kong from the headline entirely. HN sort of reminds me of China -- a dictatorship with zero transparency and a penchant for manipulation. Edit: Can't forget the spineless bootlickers who are hopelessly devoted to the state! You know you've struck a nerve when the best 'reply' they can offer is a silent downvote.

Why do you hang out on a site that you would compare to a dictatorial China? It seems like a poor use of time.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#264

Post by rshnotsecure »

nullc wrote: post #207

So HN changed the headline to remove TikTok which is a name I reconized and replaced it with "ByteDance" and "Musical.ly", which I've never heard of before. It was originally displayed on HN the same as it is in the article. From the article, I know that the new headline is more precise. But it's much less informative, I wouldn't have clicked the article under this name.

https://news.ycombinator.com is run by M5 Hosting out of San Diego.

M5 Hosting is also known as M5 Computer Security out of San Diego.

These firms are a strange choice for a place like YCombinator to host I think.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#265

Post by markdown »

bilbo0s wrote: post #246
molteanu wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Your boy cracked my son's head!" "Your boy started it first. He broke mine's leg!" "Yeah, a cracked head is not even remotely similar to a broken leg!" Moral of the story: Broken legs are normal.

In the world of international relations, there really are no good guys. But in a world where everyone is a bad guy, hypocrisy can be forgiven, since it keeps other bad guys in check despite its self-serving intent. Hypocrisy, whether European, Russian, American or Chinese, keeps the peace.

> In the world of international relations, there really are no good guys.

Bhutan. Bhutan are the good guys.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#266

Post by quaquaqua1 »

yorwba wrote: post #258
CharlesColeman wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I absolutely do not understand why there is so much hate for Chinese people, Chinese companies, or the Chinese government. > please do not act as if your statements about Chinese nationals I think it's misleading to bring up the Chinese people in this way: the "hate," if it can even be called that, is for the Chinese government and the CCP . The real or imagined influence of the CCP over Chinese companies is causin…

> the "hate," if it can even be called that, is for the Chinese government and the CCP. You may only hate the government, but you should be aware that many of those who seem to be on your side criticising the CPC do in fact hate everything Chinese. They think that not only the government, but all Chinese people are untrustworthy; that all Chinese companies are mere fronts for the government that should not be allowed…

1,000,000 times this. Anyone who thinks there is not a generic "anti PROC" sentiment is forgetting what it was like to be an American in 2003 when every European personally told you how bad you were for allowing Bush to exist

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#267

Post by vkou »

wil421 wrote: post #217
vkou wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Agreed. Authoritarian governments with morally questionable methods were and are better than the West at Humanint and propaganda. Russia and China are two good examples. I recently saw a documentary about North Korea. It was talking about the Clinton talks, NK would study everyone they would speak to. They also knew with an election would change guards and wait to get what they wanted. Do you think that the US Depa…

> Authoritarian governments with morally questionable methods were and are better than the West at Humanint and propaganda. Better than implies they are doing the same thing as the West but are more effective.

How do you know they are more effective at it? Who is telling you this? Someone who is driving a barbarians-at-the-gates narrative, and stands to profit for it? Someone who spent their life working in a department that is always asking for more money?

All we have to go on is the word of insiders who work for the various ministries, and all of these insiders have their own agenda. They certainly aren't opening up their organizations to outside verification of their claims!

Also, consider the context in which these negotiations take place. When NK negotiates with the US, this is the most important diplomatic conversation they have going. They are obviously going to put a lot of effort into it - as the outcome may be existential to them.

When the US negotiates with NK, it's just one of five dozen plates it is spinning at any one time. Whatever the outcome is, it's not going to be an existential crisis for the US. It's unlikely to be the most important diplomatic conversation it's going to have, and the Department of State, and the CIA will prioritize its resources accordingly.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#268

Post by ahbyb »

sol_remmy2 wrote: post #190
inetknght wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> these are mainly kids making music videos. They aren't using it to organize campaigns. I think that's a dangerously naive interpretation of the platform (or any platform really), particularly when it involves children and young adult minds.

Have you seen the weird articles on Snapchat Discover? "Why I'm never taking my mom to an x-rated convention again" "How my kitten play fetish makes me feel less alone" "Why I've been dressing like a horse for twenty years" If I had a teenage daughter, I'd feel much more comfortable with her using the Chinese tik-tok than whatever tabloid-level trash Snapchat is pushing these days. Some of these American media compan…

I agree with you. Most stuff in Snapchat is pure political propaganda and/or leftist brainwashing, which tiktok specifically bans.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#269

Post by claudeganon »

nullc wrote: post #207

So HN changed the headline to remove TikTok which is a name I reconized and replaced it with "ByteDance" and "Musical.ly", which I've never heard of before. It was originally displayed on HN the same as it is in the article. From the article, I know that the new headline is more precise. But it's much less informative, I wouldn't have clicked the article under this name.

I wonder if anyone ever built an HN title change tracker. Seems a trivial project for the audience of this site.

Re: U.S. opens a national security review of TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly

#270

Post by modulos »

cblades wrote: post #223
sol_remmy2 wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In America speech is censored by American private companies all the time. Racial or anti-semitic speech is often censored thanks for pressure from civil rights groups (i.e. https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/facebook-bans-white-n... ) and from lawsuits (i.e. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-47705904 ) Twitter has even begun censoring political speech from public figures: "Twitter will now hide — but not remove…

I think there's a pretty wide gulf between that and government-enforced censorship, to the point that comparing the two seems a bit disingenuous. "Twitter has even begun censoring political speech from public figures" vs "The FBI will require Twitter to censor political speech from public figures" I think those two scenarios are eons apart.

It is also disingenuous to refer to hate speech that breaks Twitter's rules as "political speech".
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