Since when does Congress ban websites or dictate what apps people can have on their devices? Regardless of how you feel about this particular company, I feel like no one is talking about the internet-killing precedent that's being set here, and that should be concerning.
this post was submitted on 18 Apr 2024
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To be fair they didn't actually name TikTok. That would be clearly Unconstitutional. Instead they made a bill that will only apply to one company. So unconstitutional but most people won't notice.
And even better Meta, Alphabet, Apple, and GM are all busy selling China your information as fast as they can anyways.
It's being used as an infiltration device by the Chinese government. Not that I agree butvits not just a website. Same as Twitter and Facebook bit we have more control over those.
It's being used as an infiltration device by the Chinese government
Please prove this.
There's obviously not going to be proof, it'd be huge news if there were. At the same time, I also wonder why people so adamantly defensive of TikTok in particular? It seems trivial enough to establish that they could exert an undue influence on a global audience through social media with just a few (I would think uncontroversial) assumptions
- Social platforms have more than enough information to create a good idea of your politics, personality, and interests
- Platforms such as TikTok operate on "pushing" content the algorithm wants instead of users "pulling" content they want to see
- You are not immune to propaganda. Nobody is.
With a state ownership stake in the picture, it creates a pretty uneasy tension, right? If they know (1), they could just push ads and content which would help prime you emotionally and mentally to receive that advertising via mechanism (2). This is their actual business model.
Alternatively, if so motivated, they could just as easily use that same profile and mechanism to push content which nudges the content consumer in any myriad ways (politically, socially, etc.). Start with something that's "close" to the viewer's existing views, and cumulatively keep pushing content which leads folks down pipelines. They don't even need to make the content. The users create it; the sentiment, quality, and popularity data informs which shorts to push where; refine the model based on receptivity; repeat as necessary.
Given (3), especially at the scale we're talking about with TikTok, I think it's obviously possible that the platform could be used to meaningfully influence public opinion, sow discord, spread misinformation, whatever. Whether they actually do this is purely speculative, but I also have a hard time thinking people would be quite so enthusiastically defensive of a similar social platform under direct influence from their own government?
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Same as Twitter and Facebook bit we have more control over those.
Only in the sense that the people using them to manipulate us are the same ones making the laws. They're leveraging it for their own ends, not stopping it.
The correct course of action (from the perspective of the American people, in stark contrast to that of the American government/oligarchy) would be to ban TikTok as the threat it is, and also ban Facebook, Twitter and Reddit for the threats they pose as well. The trouble is that it won't, because it is the entity wielding that weapon against the American people and will not voluntarily disarm itself.
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I'm not a ban fan but social media like that is psychological cancer that is definitely harming the young and old mentally.
Kids growing up these days have the burden of the disgusting need for social media self-promotion. They are conditioned that attention and Likes are the most valuable social currency, and waste so much of their valuable youth pursuing that hollow bullshit.
I'm keeping my kids off social media for as long as I can so they can experience growing up without Cloud-automated peer pressure.
Look what it did to boomers. Legit. Ban all that shit. Geocities for the win.
Lead exposure was probably a big part of that as well to be fair.
This will do nothing about that. If TikTok is banned, kids will just move to something else. You would have to ban all social media. Good luck with that.
They said this about TV. And game consoles. And computers. And every social media website. They said this about movies when they first came out too.
Social media is a reality of the world. This ban isn't getting rid of that, just banning one specific platform. Why is Intagram Reels acceptable but Tik Tok isn't? Because ones is owned by a Chinese company and the other isn't. That's all this ban is about. Literally nothing else.
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You can't ban peer pressure. That's like trying to stop the flow of water.
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This is all true which is why it's obvious that this ban has nothing to do with any of this considering they allow this behavior to continue just as long as these companies are also under their influence.
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Good.
Let's go further. Any company using an algorithm to profit off people's engagement has to publish the code.
Code's not enough. The data the algorithm is analyzing (both the training data and live data) has to be public too, in order to actually understand what the algorithm is doing.
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How about a digital bill of rights instead of playing ineffective whackamole?
Harm the stock portfolios of US billionaires? You sound like someone who hates receiving RVs and fishing trips.
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Glad to see Dems are taking the threat of Trump getting into power serious by focusing on issues that their base support:
- ~~Stop funding and supplying a genocide~~
- ~~Packing the clearly biased court so things like student loan forgiveness can pass and all these anti trans and other crazy far right laws get shot down~~
- ~~Not breaking rail road workers strikes~~
- Banning one of the most popular social media apps
Nevermind the bill has bipartisan support! Republicans must have ZERO to do with this bill! 🙄
Get serious or get out.
Bringing up that it had bipartisan support is completely irrelevant.
The headlines are going to be “Biden signs bill banning Tick Tok”. When his support of a horrible genocide is already depressing how much non republicans want to vote for him going out and doing this is just adding more reasons.
Maybe you and him need to get actually serious and focus on things people actually care about.
He is only campaigning on “I’m not trump” like literally if you got to his website and click on “Joes Vision” you get taken to a 404 page. There’s nothing talking about where he stands on issues or what he offers.
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Nevermind the bill has bipartisan support!
In general, "bipartisan" just means the oligarchs are teaming up to fuck over the people.
The good "bipartisan" bills are the ones that the Republicans and Democrats come together in solidarity to vote down.
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If I have it correct, the law wouldn’t immediately ban TikTok but would require it to actually be sold to a real US company within a certain amount of days otherwise it’d get banned. The CCP obviously doesn’t want that. So if this passes, TikTok isn’t removed immediately.
Probably what happens is the CCP, I mean Bytedance, sells it to a US company then puts their people there to still siphon data.
The law is to force any company that isn't US owned that the US doesn't like to hand over ownership. Regardless of your thoughts on TikTok/ByteDance/China in general, this is not a law one should praise. It's incredibly dangerous and is one more step toward the US becoming a full-fledged fascist state.
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I guarantee you that Facebook, Twitter and Google are selling data to China on the regular. And anyone else willing to pay up.
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60% of Bytedance is owned by institutional investors. It's a private company. The CCP doesn't own the company. 3 of the 5 board members are American. Don't spread made up bullshit. If there's any reason not to sell the company to a US company is because only 150 million Americans are tiktok users on an app with over a billion monthly active users globally. Not to mention that the US companies are gonna lowball the shit out of their offers because they think Bytedance is gonna be begging to sell. Also, there's a chance that if the US bans tiktok, then maybe they could get access to China, which tiktok is not currently available in.
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It's already run by a Singaporean group. Transferring it to the US is just a chance for our Social Media conglomerates to part it out and destroy competition.
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Cool, do Twitter next. Wait, ban Elon..into the sun.
Twitter gives US agencies data, they are cool bro
China banned pretty much all the US social media..... I bet, they will complain when the same happens to them......
House Speaker Johnson plans to package TikTok legislation with critical aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, and send it to the Senate. President Joe Biden vowed to sign it into law.
So it's a rider with some important and time sensitive other things that need to pass. Headline is totally (and probably intentionally) misleading.
He could veto it, but it would cause actual harm because those funding bills would have to go back to Congress delaying much needed aid to Ukraine and Taiwan.
Biden has already indicated he in on-board with the TikTok ban so even if it wasn't bundled in he would sign it. https://apnews.com/article/biden-tiktok-ban-house-china-aaa884d8c974f0a35856af5ee6aa4e99
Biden has come out in favor of this bill already, the hold up is in the senate.
Even if it passes, I would expect TikTok to immediately sue and gain a temporary stay on enforcement. How it shakes out in court is not my area of expertise.
Goddam this is dumb as shit.
Please help a fellow non-US citizen understand. How can this be a bipartisan agreement and, what’s its difference to the “video games cause violence” bit? I dislike TikTok as well (and I will never use it) but I think banning it nationwide is taking it too far.
How can this be a bipartisan agreement
Both sides dislike other countries having the spy power. Or anything, really. US got serious overcompensation issues with being the biggest and baddest at everything.
What’s its difference to the “video games cause violence” bit
China likely actually is spying and TikTok probably does actually do some harm, unlike video games and violence. Definetelt nowhere near justification for this shit though.
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