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TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

reuters.com

641–650 of 1001 posts

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#641

Perhaps other countries will also regulate or ban social media companies.

I'm rooting for a Twitter ban in Europe. Musk has shown willingness to temper with elections in at least two European countries, and the ban would also leave a message for Zuck.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#642

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US censorship of Chinese social media apps on these grounds sure makes it look like China was completely justified in doing it first.

Could you elaborate on that? I have no clue how the US banning TikTok for granting the CCP the ability to algorithmically influence the views of Americans somehow justifies the decade plus of the GFW, blocking Western social media, rampant censorship, etc.

The US government has never provided any direct evidence of their claims of CCP puppet-mastery, the whole thing is generally some combination of "Trust me bro" and "Well obviously China's government is gonna control a Chinese company."

Meanwhile China's reasoning for blocking US companies has been eerily similar arguments the entire time. Hard to prove them wrong when we have the major aristocrats of US tech companies completely prostrating themselves at Mar-a-Lago, offering bribes (er, sorry, the going term is "funding inauguration parties") to the incoming administration in broad daylight, staffing themselves with party officials, etc.

Arguably both are right, and it's a shame because the general working class people of both nations have more in common with each other than they do with their ruling classes. I think the thing that terrifies those in authority the most is the idea that the citizenry might realize this if there's enough communication.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#643
post #628

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's mostly true and it's a good thing for the US to prevent hostile, autocratic, foreign powers from gaining undue cultural power.

I think you've been propagandized because having autocratic private institutions having undue cultural power is proving to be worse for our culture than anything a foreign country has done to us. Don't believe me, we've got lots of data correlating the rise of social media and mental health crisis. As time moves on the evidence linking the two continues to become stronger.

You strained to look past the parent’s point, nowhere did they excuse the private institutions for their part in this; just that a totally unaccountable foreign power having this capability is not ideal.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#644
I was surprised most by the general publics ignorance regarding possible work arounds. Nobody I spoke to on large Tik Tok lives believed it was even possible to download and install apps from somewhere other than the Play Store. Apple users believed their ability to install apps was identical to Android users

In the future I think the government can force the public to do things simply because the public is unaware of the options they have.

The good news is Rednote seems to be a potential replacement, which is also Chinese owned.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide examples of China controlled propaganda happening on Tiktok? Things that are factually true don't count, obviously.

Surely you can't think propaganda is just spreading lies... Contextual presentation can change how true information is perceived. Seeing a perspective more will align your own with it.

I know of many instances in which Meta suppressed specific opinions, but I don't know any of TikTok doing the same thing. Examples are welcome, if you have any.

Or is this just about Tiktok not being owned by a billionaire who will use censorship to keep the USA government happy?

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#646

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US censorship of Chinese social media apps on these grounds sure makes it look like China was completely justified in doing it first.

Could you elaborate on that? I have no clue how the US banning TikTok for granting the CCP the ability to algorithmically influence the views of Americans somehow justifies the decade plus of the GFW, blocking Western social media, rampant censorship, etc.

I think the OP is saying that both nations are banning software because of the risks of the software/data collection posing risks to the political stability of each nation. You can obviously say "our reason is better because X", but the outcomes being the same means that there is justification.

Both sides say it's worth banning "Tiktok/Google for granting the CCP/USA the ability to algorithmically influence the views of Chinese/Americans".

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#647

US citizens do not want this. Every news article descending into tangents on any other point than that is part of why we can't have nice things. The whole country has turned into some sort of lower primate improv troupe where whatever stupid thing comes up gets a "Yes and let's" diversion instead of an adult in the room standing up and cutting the crap.

I’m a us citizen and I do want this. Speak for yourself. China bans us social media. Us should ban Chinese social media.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#648

Earlier quoted context omitted.

for those curious why an app would name itself Little Red Book despite the association, obviously they could have been better about the naming, but they're actually not the same name in either language: The social media app Xiaohongshu (小红书) does literally translate to "little red book" in English. However, this is completely different from Mao's famous work, which was never called this in Chinese. Mao's book was inf…

The way people are talking about the name of the app feels very stupid to me, in a way I can't put my finger on. I guess it smacks of more Red Scare paranoia, trying to tie anything Chinese to scary, nefarious communists. I doubt that they were thinking of Mao at all when making the app, Xiaohongshu is an app tailored for young, wealthy, cosmopolitan Chinese as an alternative to Douyin which is more for the masses, I…

it probably isnt, and is just a random name, but it feels like the name is a joke about the red scare

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#649
post #614

Let’s be clear about one thing: it’s never about protecting the privacy of private citizens—that’s just the justification. Social networking platforms are among the most effective tools for mass influence, second only to religion. The U.S. has held a monopoly on this power, leveraging it to gather data on citizens worldwide and projecting our value systems onto others. Banning TikTok is simply an effort by us to main…

> it’s never about protecting the privacy of private citizens—that’s just the justification

...but it wasn't. It was clearly and explicitly about national security.

Re: TikTok preparing for U.S. shut-off on Sunday

#650
post #614

Let’s be clear about one thing: it’s never about protecting the privacy of private citizens—that’s just the justification. Social networking platforms are among the most effective tools for mass influence, second only to religion. The U.S. has held a monopoly on this power, leveraging it to gather data on citizens worldwide and projecting our value systems onto others. Banning TikTok is simply an effort by us to main…

> Social networking platforms are among the most effective tools for mass influence, second only to religion.

There is no evidence for this belief. Really for either religion or for "social networking platforms".

You could maybe make the claim that this is true in terms of reach, but the implication here is that "these mediums can be used deliberately to influence people in a chosen direction", and this is just kind of silly. It's fun to imagine that some nefarious powers (or benificent powers) have some magical insight into how to make people believe things but this just isn't true and I think intuitively we all understand that.

To make the case that this is true you would have to do an examination of all attempts to spread messages, not just look at successful cases where messages catch on. Nobody has the power to do this on demand through some principled approach, or else they would be emperor of the world.

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