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TikTok goes dark in the US

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Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#871

Post by ncr100 »

katamari-damacy wrote: post #709
moviet wrote: post #695

(Perspective from an American) Information is the gold of the 21st century. Whoever controls the flow of information has all the wealth and all the power. Therefore, data is the greatest currency in the world. This outcome was never intended to happen, but ByteDance is taking a chance that the American government will relent. We’ll see in a few months who wins the stalemate. TikTok has an immense amount of cultural p…

[flagged]

I wonder how much foreign disinformation misinformation campaigning is gaming the priority here.

It's in China's interest -- not a small population -- for tiktok to continue to influence American thought.

So I speculate we are witnessing HN being influenced by mis/disinfo.

Eg I see here many repeated "Free Speech" being a corporate mandate claims, and other easily discounted factually unsound claims, misleading the conversation.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#872

Post by forgetfulness »

rvz wrote: post #6

The 170 million users of this digital crack / cocaine platform has now got their supply cut off and its users are desperately running for the next hit. Rednote "Xiaohongshu" appears to be where they are going to. It is also a test for "Rednote" and if they grow extremely fast in the next 90 days then that will be another ban target. But this is all temporary and they will run back to TikTok again. But again 170 milli…

Zuckerberg would rather have them hooked on the "save europa" content in his platform, there's little more than that to this ban.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#873

Post by whimsicalism »

int_ wrote: post #349
jandrewrogers wrote: post #308

A point I think most people don’t understand is that the government interest in TikTok has little to do with exploiting user data per se, a lot of other companies do that. The issue is that TikTok is somewhat unique in being aggressively weaponized in currently very active “grey zone” conflicts. This has been an open secret in national security circles but the average person on the street has no idea what a grey zone…

They can’t manufacture consent anymore regarding false flag wars that only benefit large war profiteering corporations.

what “false flag” war has the US engaged in? would love a single legit example of a false flag, closest i can think of is gulf of tonkin which was quite some time ago and not actually a false flag.

i hate that nationalism is becoming another hyper-polarized topic - now we get people who are ridiculously jingoistic/anti-cosmopolitan and other people who reject fully the notion that a government’s first responsibility is to its own citizens. both are radical views that are no way to govern a well-functioning republic.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#874

Post by screye »

mcherm wrote: post #766
bakuninsbart wrote: post #725

As a European, I find it quite outrageous to demand a company be sold to the US because it is too successful and valuable to be foreign-held. It is the old-school imperialist school of thought. If you think Bytedance is harming Americans, despite following american law, then amend the rules for social media companies. Or at least be honest enough to say: "The free market is great, but only if we hold all the cards".

An an American, I also find it outrageous. In fact, as I understand it, our most fundamental law (the Constitution) clearly guarantees "freedom of speech and freedom of the press" which specifically means that the government may NOT shut down a particular publisher because the government does not like what they say, or who it is that owns them. Unfortunately, our Supreme Court unanimously disagrees with me about what…

From a historic standpoint, rights are peacetime luxuries.

The US sees China as an existential threat and TikTok is one of its key weapons. Tiktok is getting banned for the same reason Cuba can't have nukes. It's a national security concern.

I don't endorse it. But I understand it.

America blundered in the 80s by allowing technology transfer to then and still hostile foreign power. It has woken up to its stupidity 45 years too late. But better late than never.

It's not fair.....but love and war Yada yada.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#875

Post by tensor »

mcherm wrote: post #766
bakuninsbart wrote: post #725

As a European, I find it quite outrageous to demand a company be sold to the US because it is too successful and valuable to be foreign-held. It is the old-school imperialist school of thought. If you think Bytedance is harming Americans, despite following american law, then amend the rules for social media companies. Or at least be honest enough to say: "The free market is great, but only if we hold all the cards".

An an American, I also find it outrageous. In fact, as I understand it, our most fundamental law (the Constitution) clearly guarantees "freedom of speech and freedom of the press" which specifically means that the government may NOT shut down a particular publisher because the government does not like what they say, or who it is that owns them. Unfortunately, our Supreme Court unanimously disagrees with me about what…

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the constitution only applies to American citizens, not corporations, and certainly not foreign citizens.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#876

Post by krab »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #725

As a European, I find it quite outrageous to demand a company be sold to the US because it is too successful and valuable to be foreign-held. It is the old-school imperialist school of thought. If you think Bytedance is harming Americans, despite following american law, then amend the rules for social media companies. Or at least be honest enough to say: "The free market is great, but only if we hold all the cards".

They did it before. See for example the history of Merck, a German pharma company during WW1.

> The free market is great, but only if we hold all the cards.

I think that's the actual reasoning. Be mindful that USA is our ally but they'll always prefer their own interest and that's normal.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#877

Post by robswc »

bakuninsbart wrote: post #725

As a European, I find it quite outrageous to demand a company be sold to the US because it is too successful and valuable to be foreign-held. It is the old-school imperialist school of thought. If you think Bytedance is harming Americans, despite following american law, then amend the rules for social media companies. Or at least be honest enough to say: "The free market is great, but only if we hold all the cards".

> because it is too successful and valuable to be foreign-held

That is not the reason at all. I highly doubt if it was made in Europe, it would be banned.

China would never allow a TikTok equivalent to operate in China, which is smart. We should do the same.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#878

Post by someonehere »

There’s proof from Federal agencies that they knew the algorithm was intentionally being weaponized to agitate and promote domestic protestors. Just look at the Chinese consulate shut down when 45 was in office last in Texas. It was rumored to be the base of operations for where the Chinese were weaponizing the algorithm against American interests.

Re: TikTok goes dark in the US

#880

Post by quotemstr »

TrackerFF wrote: post #686
dns_snek wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any evidence supporting anything you claimed as a matter of fact? "grey zone conflicts", "aggressively weaponized", "national security circles" are just scary/serious sounding phrases that sound a lot more legitimate than I suspect they actually are. AOC published a video talking about how she (and some other representatives) believed that the arguments that were presented to them were just as vague, nons…

Well, you have the recent Romanian election. Pro-Russian, right-wing candidate (Calin Georgescu) with zero funding becomes leading candidate overnight. Turns out there's coordinate campaigns to push him on social media channels, like TikTok, where tens of thousands of accounts were opened a couple of weeks prior to polls opening. All pushing Calin. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cm2v13nz202o

So what? People freely chose to vote for Calin. He won. Why does it matter how these voters came to their decisions?

Deep down, the sorts of people who'd ban TikTok and overturn the Romanian election are those who believe they, not the people collectively, get to weigh the merit of ideas. They see democracy as a rubber stamp for elite consensus. If the rubber stamp malfunctions, it's time to fix it. This attitude is a betrayal of centuries of liberal values that made this country and the west generally what it is today.

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