Do it. Let the US be a closed censored state like it desperately wants to be.
They’ll even put the hashtag #freespeach when they deliver their ban.
unlawfulbooger@lemmy.blahaj.zone
on 15 Jan 17:10
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🧊 🍑
aviationeast@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 17:11
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Do it. Let the hate flow through you.
lurch@sh.itjust.works
on 15 Jan 17:32
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Free speech means the government will let citizens criticise them or communicate other political opinions without sanctions. It does not mean they can’t ban one channel of communication when they are worried foreign actors use it to take advantage of the citizens. There are plenty other channels through which the citizens can communicate their opinions.
It’s a .ml tankie, they only care because it’s a Chinese company, guaranteed if it was like a UK company or something they wouldn’t say a word about it lmao
“Worried foreign actors use it to take advantage if the citizens” you mean like Cambridge analytica and facebook? Yet all the government did to them is go after their competitors and give them more power. How strange.
Yall are so thirsty for the boot because its currently stepping on the evil boogeyman our government has trained us to hate
Especially now that trumps coming into power its shocking so much people on here are excited for the government to shut down an app. What makes yall think they wont target lemmy/mastadon/etc once theyre the apps being used show people the genocides being commited by the US and israel
Yeah which is just xenophobic and dumb and doesnt protect Americans. We need comprehensive data protection laws and transparent algorithms not laws that help monopolies gain even more power to manipulate us
NineMileTower@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:26
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Should Facebook be banned in China?
alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
on 15 Jan 20:12
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You shut down one app, ten other apps get more popular
riskable@programming.dev
on 15 Jan 17:31
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Yes but diversity is good 👍
Why let the Chinese get all the eyeballs for propaganda? Surely we should give other nations a chance?
IMHO they should shut down every app that is both popular and has an exceedingly difficult to penetrate monopoly. Let the competitors rush in and do a it again when the same situation occurs!
NineMileTower@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:25
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I have my doubts that any app will collect the user base back together ever again. I may be wrong, but once TikTok is gone, people will splinter to different apps that are nowhere near as popular.
Good! Hopefully one of those other apps is federated and free from any hostile interests.
chronicledmonocle@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 17:24
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Any social media that you isn’t open and self hostable (Lemmy, Mastodon, etc) should not be used. That includes Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok, and more.
Most social media has, IMHO, been a net-negative for society and I am in the generation that grew up with it in its infancy.
BaroqueInMind@lemmy.one
on 15 Jan 18:14
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I second this opinion. The federated applications and communities aren’t perfect, but it’s less toxic and better to use in general due to the lack of an all-encompassing algorithm that guides your usage to increase views for ad revenue.
baronvonj@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:35
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My one wish for Fediverse would be federated identities. So I don’t have to have baronvonj@<platform> for ever single one of them.
chronicledmonocle@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:41
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On the plus side, it’s nice that you don’t need a new ID for every Lemmy instance.
abeorch@friendica.ginestes.es
on 15 Jan 21:29
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baronvonj@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 22:17
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Lemmy sits a bit apart from the rest in that it doesn’t quite work for direct person-to-person interaction. Following Lemmy discussions on Mastodon is possible but clunky and Lemmy doesn’t quite know how to quiet all the @ mentions and things in comments made from Mastodon so they look really loud/busy. I can see Lemmy communities from Firefish but I don’t see any of the posts/comments (maybe I have to follow one first?). I’ve never tried following Lemmy from Pixelfed.
But each of those platforms has a different UI. The experience and features posting media on Pixelfed is much different. But I still have to setup a separate Pixelfed instance account if I want to make use of them. And my data will thus be spread across those instances. And people will need to follow both the Mastodon and Pixelfed accounts if they want to see both sets of posts. I’d love to just hat the one identity to manage with my content from all platforms associated with it.
abeorch@friendica.ginestes.es
on 15 Jan 22:46
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SynopsisTantilize@lemm.ee
on 16 Jan 03:37
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You can use mastodon from Lemmy? I don’t have it so I don’t know how that works.
abeorch@friendica.ginestes.es
on 16 Jan 16:12
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@SynopsisTantilize Well Im not entirely sure what will happen using a lemmy account byt try - Grab your Lemmy account and login a client like #Fedilab - Find a Mastodon user and comment or follow them and watch what happens.
You can’t follow Mastodon users from Lemmy. You can view their profiles, but messaging them doesn’t seem to work (I receive no notification of it on Mastodon) and it only shows you the comments they made on Lemmy rather than all their posts. You can @ mention Mastodon users in Lemmy posts and comments, and that works. And they can follow Lemmy communities and their replies show up in the post comments.
hiramfromthechi@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 17:39
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You’re describing what Tim Berners-Lee is tryna build with Solid.
baronvonj@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 18:17
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Ooh, snazzy. I’ll give it a look.
QualifiedKitten@lemmy.world
on 17 Jan 17:31
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I see a GitHub and Xitter linked on there. Any clue if they have a Mastodon or something similar that I could follow?
hiramfromthechi@lemmy.world
on 17 Jan 20:38
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Not as far as I know. There’s this Mastodon, but doesn’t look legit: mastodon.online/@Solid
That would go beyond the ban’s requirement for app stores to stop offering downloads of the app, but not immediately halt use of it.
Before the tankies get mad about the “censorship” of the US while failing to mention the LONG list of things you can get straight up arrested for in China
When I was able to speak to Ms. Wu about the “tea drinking” session (euphemism for police harassment), she sharply conveyed her sense of vulnerability due to the lack of interest in her stepping away from her popular Twitter account, stating,
Literally the only thing that was keeping me online for the past few years was they were worried it would make China look bad if they cracked down on me. Now that they know that I could be dead in a ditch tomorrow and no one would give a shit or say a word I’m 1000x less safe here.
[…]
Wu added,
After years of doing this without anyone saying anything, on June 30th, out of the blue, they send plainclothes thugs to my house. Surprise! They were real cops.
Why? because she’s LGBTQ+, has a Uyghur partner, and has some friends in Western nations.
riskable@programming.dev
on 15 Jan 17:34
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Reminder: TikTok is not actually important. Everyone can live their lives without TikTok, YouTube, etc. There’s an infinite amount of ways to entertain ourselves and there’s a lot of competing apps.
This isn’t the government abusing its power to shut down some small business/upstart. It’s shutting down a serious national security threat and a monopoly. TikTok has abused their position many times in many ways, refused to cooperate, and has reached the, “find out” phase.
NineMileTower@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 17:56
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There is a false dichotomy on Lemmy, that the government should shut down Meta due to security threats too because of this. They can both be bad.
shoulderoforion@fedia.io
on 15 Jan 17:59
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Yeah, they should shut down both. Honestly, X should be on the chopping block even faster that Meta, but Zuck seems committed to racing Musk to the bottom.
NineMileTower@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:27
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I finally drew the line last week and deleted my Meta accounts.
I’ve never even looked at it. Vine was pretty cool but then it died, Periscope was neat, but I dunno, something about Tiktok feels predatory, how addictive it is (from what I’ve seen of others using it).
Plus while they’re all as bad as each other, I still trust China less than Microsoft with my stuff, so yeah. I’m just not interested in it and don’t really see the appeal for myself. But I see why it’s popular and it’s not like, terrible, as a concept.
Why can’t more of that be patched out via ReVanced or similar? Or is it so integral to the platform itself?
Buelldozer@lemmy.today
on 15 Jan 21:32
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Everyone can live their lives without TikTok, YouTube…
I was an adult before YT and I don’t want to go back to a time before it existed. It’s just too damn useful as a self education tool. Need to learn how to DIY a plumbing problem? Youtube. Need to learn how to subnet a network? Youtube. Interested in the History of Moldova? Youtube.
I finished my basement by watching youtube videos and learning how to do everything from framing to electrical to drywall to finishing work. There isn’t anywhere else you can freely get the same breadth of knowledge on-demand.
They’re what we used before everyone had the worlds store of knowledge in their pocket.
I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 17:15
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Can’t get ahold of your friend in Europe and you’re from the US? Just wait until you learn about “handwriting a letter and waiting weeks/months for it to get to them and having to wait even longer for a reply”
It’s what we used to do before everyone found a much faster and more convenient way of doing something through modern technology.
And I’m not sure the instant communication has been a benefit for us.
edit: especially when it becomes more and more misinformation and AI slop day by day
astropenguin5@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 17:28
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Libraries are good, and a great community resource that should be treasured. However, no library can have the sheer volume of information available that YouTube and the Internet do. There is also the benefit of having more kinds of content, plus the ease of putting information out there.
For example, say I want to learn about the specifics of the defense economics of the war in Ukraine. Sure, I could wait 15 years for books to be published about it, hope my local library buys it, and then go and read it. Or I could log on to YouTube right now and go watch the latest Perun video on it which is also more entertaining. This also is an example of speed of new information being available on current events.
Both of these things have their strengths and weaknesses but it is simply a fact that YouTube has changed the availability of information to quite a high degree.
Default_Defect@midwest.social
on 16 Jan 21:12
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Yeah, lemme just put on a coat and walk an hour and a half in winter weather to my local library to find a book to tell me how to replace my car’s starter motor.
I still remember the smell of Card Catalogs; a nice mix of old paper and even older wood. Video instructions are often faster and easier to understand. They’re also more accessible.
I don’t entirely agree. TikTok isn’t just silly dances, thirst traps, and trends—it has played a significant role in community organizing and coalition-building across social movements. Consider the university Pro-Palestine encampments or mainstream news reporting on social media reaction to the United Healthcare CEO’s killing. Neither is solely attributable to TikTok, but the scale and nature of discussion on the platform have demonstrably influenced real-world conversation and activism. Another example is Keith Lee’s viral restaurant reviews transforming the viability of small mom and pop businesses overnight.
What sets TikTok apart isn’t just its massive reach (150 million monthly active users, nearly half the US population) but also its algorithm and features that enable collaborative, asynchronous discussion. Unlike YouTube Shorts or Instagram Reels, where content is mostly one-off entertainment with fleeting comment sections, TikTok fosters actual conversations. Features like stitching allow users to directly respond to others, creating an evolving discourse where users can trace context. At times, entire feeds become dominated by discussion of a single topic—sometimes celebrity gossip, but often major events like October 7 or the United Healthcare CEO killing. This level of organic, large-scale discourse doesn’t happen the same way on other platforms. A great example of this dynamic was when TikTok users collectively decided to migrate to the actually Chinese app XiaoHongShu specifically to spite the US government. That didn’t just happen—it was discussed and coordinated.
In my view, TikTok is a national security threat not because of unproven claims about data leaks or state-authored propaganda, but because it provides an already restless and dissatisfied population with a real platform to discuss issues and organize. If a decentralized, open-source alternative existed at scale, TikTok itself wouldn’t be necessary. I acknowledge that TikTok—like any centralized platform—has real issues, particularly around privacy and censorship. But until such a decentralized alternative gains traction, TikTok remains important. And even then, I doubt the US government would be any more comfortable with a decentralized version, since it still wouldn’t give them control over what discussions take place.
This is absurd. Facebook was literally used to sow division and help elect a fascist who constantly says he wants to rule for life and wants to imprison his enemies. Facebook and instagram is wayyyyy more of a national security threat.
A congressman explicitly stated tiktok videos are swaying the opinion of people against israel and america’s genocide in palestine and now its being shut down. This is an abuse of power and its laughable you dont care because “china bad”
If its not censorship because theres alternative ways to communicate than nothing is censorship other than being killed
Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
on 15 Jan 21:21
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Honestly it’s probably more likely that China bans the US users first. RedNote is openly CCP incorporated and has very strict community rules and heavy censorship. Cleavage is censored, I was cracking up because people’s profile pics got denied and they couldn’t understand the Mandarin to know why.
TommySoda@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 18:09
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I’m honestly surprised more content creators on TikTok haven’t raised a stink about this from what I’ve seen. Agree with it or not, for some people this is their livelihood.
IIRC TikTok is rather top heavy in terms of income and this highest tier of influencers is diversified across all media channels anyway.
Regular folk have better luck making money on YouTube and Instagram so TikTok creators are unusual bunch. In my experience (which is very likely shaped by the algorithm) they are a mix of talent show performers, odd personalities and no longer relevant one hit wonders that got lucky. They’re mostly sad about losing that space because it’s so different to alternatives. I don’t think anyone that doesn’t have much money feels in power anymore so what are they going to do?
Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
on 15 Jan 21:19
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Yeah, but those affiliate links made people bank, especially during the holidays.
I actually got like half my ideas and my daughters from the tiktok shop. (Then went and bought it on Aliexpress)
Most content creators that I know have either openly stated that they prefer it shutting down because it’s such a royal pain in the ass to use TikTok since it’s audience is so different than their other platforms, or have said they stopped using it without showing a position, the only reason they used it in the first place is because that’s where the audience is but they would much prefer other alternatives
recreationalcatheter@lemm.ee
on 15 Jan 18:27
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And no offense to US folks, I love their culture and when I visit people are the nicest. I’m just tired of US politics and it seems to touch everything these days
recreationalcatheter@lemm.ee
on 16 Jan 17:32
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Great! You’re in luck!
shininghero@pawb.social
on 15 Jan 18:27
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Is Loops ready for wide scale adoption and federation yet? We kinda need a replacement for tiktok, otherwise the addicts will jump to yet another Chinese platform.
Aatube@kbin.melroy.org
on 15 Jan 18:31
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There's a ton of domestic TikTok clones already, like Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.
otherwise the addicts will jump to yet another Chinese platform.
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 22:53
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Cool.
Cool cool cool.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
on 15 Jan 22:58
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Ok.
(I bet tiktok doesn’t shut down, but if it does I can’t wait for my kids to tell me about all the meltdowns at middle school over tiktok shutting down. Too many parents let their kids have unfettered internet access. No, mine don’t have tiktok.)
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 17:38
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No. They don’t.
I installed the home LAN, set site restrictions, app restrictions, use parental controls on all their devices, use OpenDNS family shield, PiHole, and app installation controls on their devices.
Even of they did find a way to see it I would see the IP address flagged.
Sounds draconian, but social media is fucked up for kids. They can have access at 16. They have a shitload of other internet freedom, though. They’re good kids.
And all of their friends have the same firewalls when they go to hang out?
Not trying to be rude but it seems kinda naive.
My little sister is also not allowed on tiktok but she just uses it on her friend’s phones when they hang out.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
on 17 Jan 16:44
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Their web browsers are restricted off. They cannot install any apps. This discussion is about what my kids have on their devices, and telling me they might see it elsewhere is irrelevant.
I don’t think you understand my knowledge level, you do me disservice by assuming I’m naive, and your rudeness is because of changing the conditions of the discussion to make yourself right by changing the parameters based on that invented naïveté.
No, I can’t control what they see at their friend’s houses on someone else’s device. I saw the playboy channel at a friend’s house when I was a kid and I didn’t have cable at my house. That’s what kids do. I understand and accept this. I’m not a tyrant or control freak or clutching my pearls. That’s the part where you get to discuss good and bad about social media or any aspect of the internet with your kids, like a parent is supposed to do, and do your best to protect your kids’ mental and physical wellbeing within reason.
Ok I think this is a misunderstanding about what it means to “have tiktok”. If you mean in the context of your house sure.
But I had this same conversation with my parents. There is no reasonable way to actually prevent a kid from having access to tiktok in some contexts. Parents who say their kids don’t use tiktok because it’s not allowed at home are just incorrect.
My dad doesn’t get that when she hangs out with friends or goes to school, she IS seeing tiktok content.
A lot of people are saying that the US government banned TikTok, but from what I’m understanding, that’s not really what happened and what’s happening. Or have I misinterpreted things? From what I understand, they were told they had to divest and sell, but they fought that and now are opting to shutdown rather than comply. Is that not the case?
Either way, I’m gonna go all “I walked to school uphill both ways barefoot in a meter of snow” on this and say that my very little experience with TikTok users seems to suggest that its not much more than pure, unadulterated brain rot. So regardless of the fact(s) (i.e. shutdown / banned / etc), there’s maybe the tiniest sliver of a net positive here. Or not. It doesn’t affect me one way or the other and given where this country is politically (as well as where it is headed), I don’t give a rat poopoo.
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 03:27
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how dare you bring an enlightened perspective into the Chinese brain rot on this platform! /s
surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 03:59
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brain rot
It’s a superior algorithm. You get what you engage with.
I’m going to miss the largest community of left leaning American creators, educators, and activists. I’ve learned so much about politics, social engagement, and community building.
But that’s just my feed. I’m sure there’s a lot of crap too.
I’m posting the same comment in two replies here now, terrible behaviour, but yes exactly this was an attempt to force a sale and get tiktok into American ownership.
It feels very neat that America would think tiktok would ultimately choose the option where it gets more money, but that the Chinese instead choose control.
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 09:02
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that being the case, doesn’t that provide more merit to tiktok being a data mining operation that China uses against American interests?
crystalmerchant@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 02:33
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There will just be a new (US based) TikTok copycat that springs up, or many. Banning one social media cancer doesn’t stop the others
If that was the case people would be using Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts but they are just bad copies that don’t understand what features made TT popular. „The Algorithm” will be impossible to copy and that’s what kept people there.
This is all about pressuring Bytedance to sell to any of the large US companies dying to get that user base. Remember that one party is currently loaded with tech bros with no ethics.
Bytedance seems willing to play chicken and hit the wall as a gamble about coming out of this less hurt than anyone else.
rob200@endlesstalk.org
on 16 Jan 02:39
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“They” say they are banning it over national security concerns I think it’s deeper then that. They can’t have a socialist like platform having an audience. Which in my opinion is why they wanted to force a sell or just ban Tiktok.
I don’t think, that they will go after Rednote if it doesn’t gain popularity the way that Tiktok did.
Maybe not TIktok itself, I was mainly referring that it’s maintained by a Chinese company. Too many people in the u.s think China is communist, but it’s lately more like socialism.
But whether it’s socialism, or communism, the Republican party most outspokenly, won’t have either one of those. Mainly because it can devalues the capitalists.
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 03:24
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China is socialist like 1940 Germany was socialist.
can’t really explain those camps away, can they…
recreationalcatheter@lemm.ee
on 16 Jan 17:38
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Yes the country with 200 billionaires is totally socialist and not a capitalistic shithole borrowing honor from their own past because modern Chinese leadership is such a tragic failure.
It’s a mixed economy. and really, you’re going to try and say that China doesn’t have a socialist leaning?
I’m not meaning to say, that China does not have some form of capitalism; i’m saying that the u.s gov. doesn’t want a country that supports socialism to have an influence and that that is what brought my theory. The u.s tends to mostly support capitalism. There is barely any room for socialism in current u.s politics. Socialism barely makes it on the news in the u.s.
GreenKnight23@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 03:22
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This guy is getting downvoted for truth. TT is the only big media platform that consistently promotes socialist policies and openly attacks western status quo. If there are any truly ideological reasons to ban TT it was because of that. We’re being ruled by the oligarchs and their interests were threatened but let’s not kid ourselves - China has their own who’d happily take their place.
I see ZERO discussion about how this is obvious theatre. We are so incapable of standing up to basic manipulation tactics from the right.
trump first started using tiktok as another xenophobic boogeyman, in what was a fairly nuanced situation - trump’s position being completely wrong, but ultimately some truth to the fact that companies run in China inherently have involvement of the Chinese government and thule should be reached, monitored and if abused, access should be removed.
This actual push was always meant to be something to hang on Biden admin either way (because again, some valid points to a potential ban) but in reality trump will now “save” this artificial shutdown to “restore tiktok” and millions of low information voters and non voters alike will think he did something. And in the meantime, whatever the fuck this lemon8 and red whatever apps are will likely be a huge privacy monitoring home as midst will leave things dormant in background as well after tiktok is “restored”.
Again, we are just so I’ll equipped for anything to do with technology.
And, well, I assume everything coming from the US is theater entertainment from the get-go. That’s why I don’t even bother discussing it anymore although I have recently pointed that out about Trump is trying to divert with the Greenland fiasco and the media is being complicit. This is just another one of the pile. I think he’s purposely flooding the media and pushing for Americans’ mental exhaustion.
ultimately some truth to the fact that companies run in China inherently have involvement of the Chinese government
I’d say that’s an understatement. The Chinese government is greatly involved in many aspects of their social media because they don’t have speech protections for individuals nor the press. Xi wants absolute control, so the Chinese government is also involved in other questionable news this week about sponsoring hackers who were primarily targeting the US for gathering intelligence: Millions of Americans caught up in Chinese hacking plot - US. They had state-sponsored malware on 10,000 computers targeting civil rights activists. It doesn’t seem in their interest to play fair, I wonder what their strategy would be if Trump steps in to stroke hes ego.
Also, part of me thinks one of his aides overheard someone talking about banning TikTok for this reason and thought to himself, “Sounds good but it’s too leftist for us to peddle. This would be great to pin on the old geezer!.” and pitched it to Trump as a win-win. It’s absurd, don’t listen to me.
DancingBear@midwest.social
on 16 Jan 03:46
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It weirds me out that I can easily see a post is in lemmy.world by the comments
recreationalcatheter@lemm.ee
on 16 Jan 17:36
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nobody told me federated social media would be federated boofuckinghoo
DancingBear@midwest.social
on 17 Jan 18:57
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It’s valuable, it’s not as valuable as the entire rest of the world combined. The US simply doesn’t have the user share to demand the service be sold off.
crashoverride@lemmy.world
on 16 Jan 17:49
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Did you see the post made by Zucker? They’re going to stop moderating posts, especially those made from, Right wing motherfuckers
They can moderate by boosting certain opinions and downranking others. It doesn’t need fact checkers because it’s platform owner interests and not facts that matter.
That just means they’ll favor the right wing content since it currently benefits them. They will continue to moderate and shadow hide whatever they don’t agree with or are paid to censor.
Not the same. If all the users lose access in one go and a prompt allows them to easily send a mail to their representatives then they can put pressure.
If they allow content to flow it could be 12+ months before some users start receiving errors when the ban is out of their mind. They might associate the less US content with the app not being good anymore.
Has anyone in the House or Senate leadership that has received classified briefings on this done anything to oppose it? An email campaign is going to change absolutely nothing.
threaded - newest
Do it. Let the US be a closed censored state like it desperately wants to be.
They’ll even put the hashtag #freespeach when they deliver their ban.
🧊 🍑
Do it. Let the hate flow through you.
Free speech means the government will let citizens criticise them or communicate other political opinions without sanctions. It does not mean they can’t ban one channel of communication when they are worried foreign actors use it to take advantage of the citizens. There are plenty other channels through which the citizens can communicate their opinions.
It’s a .ml tankie, they only care because it’s a Chinese company, guaranteed if it was like a UK company or something they wouldn’t say a word about it lmao
“Worried foreign actors use it to take advantage if the citizens” you mean like Cambridge analytica and facebook? Yet all the government did to them is go after their competitors and give them more power. How strange.
Yall are so thirsty for the boot because its currently stepping on the evil boogeyman our government has trained us to hate
Especially now that trumps coming into power its shocking so much people on here are excited for the government to shut down an app. What makes yall think they wont target lemmy/mastadon/etc once theyre the apps being used show people the genocides being commited by the US and israel
those were not foreign. that is where the US government and law drew the line.
Yeah which is just xenophobic and dumb and doesnt protect Americans. We need comprehensive data protection laws and transparent algorithms not laws that help monopolies gain even more power to manipulate us
Should Facebook be banned in China?
Facebook should be banned everywhere.
Already is, but should we compare US and China in terms of censorship?
Don’t tell me, a .ml user came here to complain about whataboutism.
Dumn liberals, only tankies get to do concern trolling and whataboutism.
Lol, I’ve no idea what .ml user even means. I chose an instance with no second thought. They just had a Stardew Valley community I liked.
It already is, and yes.
noooo not the cringe app!! everything but the cringe app
How many western apps are banned in west Taiwan, anyway?
You shut down one app, ten other apps get more popular
Yes but diversity is good 👍
Why let the Chinese get all the eyeballs for propaganda? Surely we should give other nations a chance?
IMHO they should shut down every app that is both popular and has an exceedingly difficult to penetrate monopoly. Let the competitors rush in and do a it again when the same situation occurs!
I have my doubts that any app will collect the user base back together ever again. I may be wrong, but once TikTok is gone, people will splinter to different apps that are nowhere near as popular.
Good! Hopefully one of those other apps is federated and free from any hostile interests.
Any social media that you isn’t open and self hostable (Lemmy, Mastodon, etc) should not be used. That includes Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok, and more.
Most social media has, IMHO, been a net-negative for society and I am in the generation that grew up with it in its infancy.
I second this opinion. The federated applications and communities aren’t perfect, but it’s less toxic and better to use in general due to the lack of an all-encompassing algorithm that guides your usage to increase views for ad revenue.
My one wish for Fediverse would be federated identities. So I don’t have to have baronvonj@<platform> for ever single one of them.
On the plus side, it’s nice that you don’t need a new ID for every Lemmy instance.
@baronvonj
What do you mean? I'm posting from a #Friendica account to #mastodon, #lemmy and #pixelfed - One account. no worries
@chronicledmonocle @technology
Lemmy sits a bit apart from the rest in that it doesn’t quite work for direct person-to-person interaction. Following Lemmy discussions on Mastodon is possible but clunky and Lemmy doesn’t quite know how to quiet all the @ mentions and things in comments made from Mastodon so they look really loud/busy. I can see Lemmy communities from Firefish but I don’t see any of the posts/comments (maybe I have to follow one first?). I’ve never tried following Lemmy from Pixelfed.
But each of those platforms has a different UI. The experience and features posting media on Pixelfed is much different. But I still have to setup a separate Pixelfed instance account if I want to make use of them. And my data will thus be spread across those instances. And people will need to follow both the Mastodon and Pixelfed accounts if they want to see both sets of posts. I’d love to just hat the one identity to manage with my content from all platforms associated with it.
@baronvonj
Use #Friendica - #lemmy works well there for me - you also got to realise there is a lot of playing around with UIs in different client apps - #Fedilab #racoon plus so many more
@technology
You can use mastodon from Lemmy? I don’t have it so I don’t know how that works.
@SynopsisTantilize
Well Im not entirely sure what will happen using a lemmy account byt try - Grab your Lemmy account and login a client like #Fedilab - Find a Mastodon user and comment or follow them and watch what happens.
There are multiple open issues for Lemmy support in FediLab, I don’t think it’s actually supported right now.
You can’t follow Mastodon users from Lemmy. You can view their profiles, but messaging them doesn’t seem to work (I receive no notification of it on Mastodon) and it only shows you the comments they made on Lemmy rather than all their posts. You can @ mention Mastodon users in Lemmy posts and comments, and that works. And they can follow Lemmy communities and their replies show up in the post comments.
You’re describing what Tim Berners-Lee is tryna build with Solid.
Ooh, snazzy. I’ll give it a look.
I see a GitHub and Xitter linked on there. Any clue if they have a Mastodon or something similar that I could follow?
Not as far as I know. There’s this Mastodon, but doesn’t look legit: mastodon.online/@Solid
Lol good luck getting the masses on board
I couldn’t care less about “the masses”. Most of the world are morons.
couldn’t care less**
Thank you. Corrected.
I don’t want the masses. They can stay in the containment shart shead.
Before the tankies get mad about the “censorship” of the US while failing to mention the LONG list of things you can get straight up arrested for in China
Or have a “tea drinking” session:
Why? because she’s LGBTQ+, has a Uyghur partner, and has some friends in Western nations.
reference: hackingbutlegal.com/…/naomi-wu-and-the-silence-th…
<img alt="" src="https://infosec.pub/pictrs/image/992f7b90-ec82-49dd-abfc-05ce00543568.png">
x.com/RealSexyCyborg/status/1177145458503737344
Reminder: TikTok is not actually important. Everyone can live their lives without TikTok, YouTube, etc. There’s an infinite amount of ways to entertain ourselves and there’s a lot of competing apps.
This isn’t the government abusing its power to shut down some small business/upstart. It’s shutting down a serious national security threat and a monopoly. TikTok has abused their position many times in many ways, refused to cooperate, and has reached the, “find out” phase.
There is a false dichotomy on Lemmy, that the government should shut down Meta due to security threats too because of this. They can both be bad.
ok, i'm for that, when do we start
Yeah, they should shut down both. Honestly, X should be on the chopping block even faster that Meta, but Zuck seems committed to racing Musk to the bottom.
I finally drew the line last week and deleted my Meta accounts.
Reminder: there’s an ongoing trade war between US and China and this is likely just a part of it.
I’ve never even looked at it. Vine was pretty cool but then it died, Periscope was neat, but I dunno, something about Tiktok feels predatory, how addictive it is (from what I’ve seen of others using it).
Plus while they’re all as bad as each other, I still trust China less than Microsoft with my stuff, so yeah. I’m just not interested in it and don’t really see the appeal for myself. But I see why it’s popular and it’s not like, terrible, as a concept.
I’m bothered that the app is 2gb.
why?
Spyware takes up space, comrade.
Why can’t more of that be patched out via ReVanced or similar? Or is it so integral to the platform itself?
I was an adult before YT and I don’t want to go back to a time before it existed. It’s just too damn useful as a self education tool. Need to learn how to DIY a plumbing problem? Youtube. Need to learn how to subnet a network? Youtube. Interested in the History of Moldova? Youtube.
I finished my basement by watching youtube videos and learning how to do everything from framing to electrical to drywall to finishing work. There isn’t anywhere else you can freely get the same breadth of knowledge on-demand.
Wait until you learn about “libraries.”
They’re what we used before everyone had the worlds store of knowledge in their pocket.
Can’t get ahold of your friend in Europe and you’re from the US? Just wait until you learn about “handwriting a letter and waiting weeks/months for it to get to them and having to wait even longer for a reply”
It’s what we used to do before everyone found a much faster and more convenient way of doing something through modern technology.
And I’m not sure the instant communication has been a benefit for us.
edit: especially when it becomes more and more misinformation and AI slop day by day
Libraries are good, and a great community resource that should be treasured. However, no library can have the sheer volume of information available that YouTube and the Internet do. There is also the benefit of having more kinds of content, plus the ease of putting information out there.
For example, say I want to learn about the specifics of the defense economics of the war in Ukraine. Sure, I could wait 15 years for books to be published about it, hope my local library buys it, and then go and read it. Or I could log on to YouTube right now and go watch the latest Perun video on it which is also more entertaining. This also is an example of speed of new information being available on current events.
Both of these things have their strengths and weaknesses but it is simply a fact that YouTube has changed the availability of information to quite a high degree.
Yeah, lemme just put on a coat and walk an hour and a half in winter weather to my local library to find a book to tell me how to replace my car’s starter motor.
I still remember the smell of Card Catalogs; a nice mix of old paper and even older wood. Video instructions are often faster and easier to understand. They’re also more accessible.
I don’t entirely agree. TikTok isn’t just silly dances, thirst traps, and trends—it has played a significant role in community organizing and coalition-building across social movements. Consider the university Pro-Palestine encampments or mainstream news reporting on social media reaction to the United Healthcare CEO’s killing. Neither is solely attributable to TikTok, but the scale and nature of discussion on the platform have demonstrably influenced real-world conversation and activism. Another example is Keith Lee’s viral restaurant reviews transforming the viability of small mom and pop businesses overnight.
What sets TikTok apart isn’t just its massive reach (150 million monthly active users, nearly half the US population) but also its algorithm and features that enable collaborative, asynchronous discussion. Unlike YouTube Shorts or Instagram Reels, where content is mostly one-off entertainment with fleeting comment sections, TikTok fosters actual conversations. Features like stitching allow users to directly respond to others, creating an evolving discourse where users can trace context. At times, entire feeds become dominated by discussion of a single topic—sometimes celebrity gossip, but often major events like October 7 or the United Healthcare CEO killing. This level of organic, large-scale discourse doesn’t happen the same way on other platforms. A great example of this dynamic was when TikTok users collectively decided to migrate to the actually Chinese app XiaoHongShu specifically to spite the US government. That didn’t just happen—it was discussed and coordinated.
In my view, TikTok is a national security threat not because of unproven claims about data leaks or state-authored propaganda, but because it provides an already restless and dissatisfied population with a real platform to discuss issues and organize. If a decentralized, open-source alternative existed at scale, TikTok itself wouldn’t be necessary. I acknowledge that TikTok—like any centralized platform—has real issues, particularly around privacy and censorship. But until such a decentralized alternative gains traction, TikTok remains important. And even then, I doubt the US government would be any more comfortable with a decentralized version, since it still wouldn’t give them control over what discussions take place.
This is absurd. Facebook was literally used to sow division and help elect a fascist who constantly says he wants to rule for life and wants to imprison his enemies. Facebook and instagram is wayyyyy more of a national security threat.
A congressman explicitly stated tiktok videos are swaying the opinion of people against israel and america’s genocide in palestine and now its being shut down. This is an abuse of power and its laughable you dont care because “china bad”
If its not censorship because theres alternative ways to communicate than nothing is censorship other than being killed
National security threat?
So how come Twitter ain’t shut down then?
"you can't fire me, i quit" well, alright, that was always and option, lol
Great!
Gen z better prep for 'em withdrawls... They love telling how they don't drink or do drugs haha
Let's see how they will cope.
Some app is about to explode
Rednote started exploding 3 days ago, it’s been #1 on android and apple stores since.
Gonna take us government few years to ban it haha
Honestly it’s probably more likely that China bans the US users first. RedNote is openly CCP incorporated and has very strict community rules and heavy censorship. Cleavage is censored, I was cracking up because people’s profile pics got denied and they couldn’t understand the Mandarin to know why.
No, it’ll probably take weeks to days; with the new law the president can unilaterally ban any foreign-owned app with 1 million users.
Watch Biden ban it on Jan 19th as a final fuck you.
/c/upliftingnews
Get this Reddit shit out of here
I’m honestly surprised more content creators on TikTok haven’t raised a stink about this from what I’ve seen. Agree with it or not, for some people this is their livelihood.
IIRC TikTok is rather top heavy in terms of income and this highest tier of influencers is diversified across all media channels anyway.
Regular folk have better luck making money on YouTube and Instagram so TikTok creators are unusual bunch. In my experience (which is very likely shaped by the algorithm) they are a mix of talent show performers, odd personalities and no longer relevant one hit wonders that got lucky. They’re mostly sad about losing that space because it’s so different to alternatives. I don’t think anyone that doesn’t have much money feels in power anymore so what are they going to do?
Yeah, but those affiliate links made people bank, especially during the holidays.
I actually got like half my ideas and my daughters from the tiktok shop. (Then went and bought it on Aliexpress)
Most content creators that I know have either openly stated that they prefer it shutting down because it’s such a royal pain in the ass to use TikTok since it’s audience is so different than their other platforms, or have said they stopped using it without showing a position, the only reason they used it in the first place is because that’s where the audience is but they would much prefer other alternatives
Cool
Bye tiktok
Or hello TikTok? I’m stoked to see a popular social network app without the US!
funny, that not one has been euro/asian/african centric so far, that has gained enough momentum or content to peak your interest yet, lol
If you know of an English speaking socisl network with those characteristics, do let me know
Too bad you can’t find a guide to locating like-minded folks on TikTok anymore
It’s really making me super sad 😢
And no offense to US folks, I love their culture and when I visit people are the nicest. I’m just tired of US politics and it seems to touch everything these days
Great! You’re in luck!
Is Loops ready for wide scale adoption and federation yet? We kinda need a replacement for tiktok, otherwise the addicts will jump to yet another Chinese platform.
There's a ton of domestic TikTok clones already, like Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.
They already have.
Doesn’t look like it to me. I tried to sign up yesterday and haven’t received the validation email.
Edit: and the UI was very barren and minimal on the video I watched.
Nowhere near imo. Download the app and see for yourself. It needs WORK.
Link to download? I checked the Play store and there’s a billion apps called Loops
Edit: I found it
loops.video
Sadly it needs a lot of work, I went on it the other day and the app itself crashed at least seven times in the 15 minutes that I was using it
People are already moving to rednote.
Just fucking get it over with already! I’m tired of hearing about this shit every single day.
Fantastic cant wait!
Stop. Don't. Come back.
Instagram reels about to get a whole lot worse
TikTok might start being not shit after this, but I’m not risking exposure until I have confirmation
Cannot wait to stop receiving these fuckin links
If you have $50 Billion, you can buy Tiktok.
I read that Elon Musk might buy it. But the CEO of Tiktok stated that, it isn’t true.
Why would he even need another social media? Besides, dictating what he wants on that site…and make it worse?
I like when Jack Dorsey ran Twitter. It is a crap hole now on there.
As for Tiktok, it won’t matter to me since I am not on there.
Not if they’re not selling
The theory is the tiktok “ban” was an attempt to force a sale on favourable terms , but tiktok has called the bluff.
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Cool.
Cool cool cool.
Ok.
(I bet tiktok doesn’t shut down, but if it does I can’t wait for my kids to tell me about all the meltdowns at middle school over tiktok shutting down. Too many parents let their kids have unfettered internet access. No, mine don’t have tiktok.)
Bet they do
No. They don’t.
I installed the home LAN, set site restrictions, app restrictions, use parental controls on all their devices, use OpenDNS family shield, PiHole, and app installation controls on their devices.
Even of they did find a way to see it I would see the IP address flagged.
Sounds draconian, but social media is fucked up for kids. They can have access at 16. They have a shitload of other internet freedom, though. They’re good kids.
Good. TikTok is pure fucking brainrot. People acting like it’s disappearance is some great tragedy make me laugh.
.
And all of their friends have the same firewalls when they go to hang out?
Not trying to be rude but it seems kinda naive.
My little sister is also not allowed on tiktok but she just uses it on her friend’s phones when they hang out.
Their web browsers are restricted off. They cannot install any apps. This discussion is about what my kids have on their devices, and telling me they might see it elsewhere is irrelevant.
I don’t think you understand my knowledge level, you do me disservice by assuming I’m naive, and your rudeness is because of changing the conditions of the discussion to make yourself right by changing the parameters based on that invented naïveté.
No, I can’t control what they see at their friend’s houses on someone else’s device. I saw the playboy channel at a friend’s house when I was a kid and I didn’t have cable at my house. That’s what kids do. I understand and accept this. I’m not a tyrant or control freak or clutching my pearls. That’s the part where you get to discuss good and bad about social media or any aspect of the internet with your kids, like a parent is supposed to do, and do your best to protect your kids’ mental and physical wellbeing within reason.
Ok I think this is a misunderstanding about what it means to “have tiktok”. If you mean in the context of your house sure.
But I had this same conversation with my parents. There is no reasonable way to actually prevent a kid from having access to tiktok in some contexts. Parents who say their kids don’t use tiktok because it’s not allowed at home are just incorrect.
My dad doesn’t get that when she hangs out with friends or goes to school, she IS seeing tiktok content.
Seems like we actually agree here though.
A lot of people are saying that the US government banned TikTok, but from what I’m understanding, that’s not really what happened and what’s happening. Or have I misinterpreted things? From what I understand, they were told they had to divest and sell, but they fought that and now are opting to shutdown rather than comply. Is that not the case?
Either way, I’m gonna go all “I walked to school uphill both ways barefoot in a meter of snow” on this and say that my very little experience with TikTok users seems to suggest that its not much more than pure, unadulterated brain rot. So regardless of the fact(s) (i.e. shutdown / banned / etc), there’s maybe the tiniest sliver of a net positive here. Or not. It doesn’t affect me one way or the other and given where this country is politically (as well as where it is headed), I don’t give a rat poopoo.
how dare you bring an enlightened perspective into the Chinese brain rot on this platform! /s
It’s a superior algorithm. You get what you engage with.
I’m going to miss the largest community of left leaning American creators, educators, and activists. I’ve learned so much about politics, social engagement, and community building.
But that’s just my feed. I’m sure there’s a lot of crap too.
I’m posting the same comment in two replies here now, terrible behaviour, but yes exactly this was an attempt to force a sale and get tiktok into American ownership.
It feels very neat that America would think tiktok would ultimately choose the option where it gets more money, but that the Chinese instead choose control.
that being the case, doesn’t that provide more merit to tiktok being a data mining operation that China uses against American interests?
There will just be a new (US based) TikTok copycat that springs up, or many. Banning one social media cancer doesn’t stop the others
If that was the case people would be using Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts but they are just bad copies that don’t understand what features made TT popular. „The Algorithm” will be impossible to copy and that’s what kept people there.
This is all about pressuring Bytedance to sell to any of the large US companies dying to get that user base. Remember that one party is currently loaded with tech bros with no ethics.
Bytedance seems willing to play chicken and hit the wall as a gamble about coming out of this less hurt than anyone else.
“They” say they are banning it over national security concerns I think it’s deeper then that. They can’t have a socialist like platform having an audience. Which in my opinion is why they wanted to force a sell or just ban Tiktok.
I don’t think, that they will go after Rednote if it doesn’t gain popularity the way that Tiktok did.
I wouldn’t really say TikTok is socialist like, but yeah it’s clear it was only banned because they don’t like it and not its harms
Maybe not TIktok itself, I was mainly referring that it’s maintained by a Chinese company. Too many people in the u.s think China is communist, but it’s lately more like socialism.
But whether it’s socialism, or communism, the Republican party most outspokenly, won’t have either one of those. Mainly because it can devalues the capitalists.
China is socialist like 1940 Germany was socialist.
can’t really explain those camps away, can they…
Yes the country with 200 billionaires is totally socialist and not a capitalistic shithole borrowing honor from their own past because modern Chinese leadership is such a tragic failure.
It’s a mixed economy. and really, you’re going to try and say that China doesn’t have a socialist leaning?
I’m not meaning to say, that China does not have some form of capitalism; i’m saying that the u.s gov. doesn’t want a country that supports socialism to have an influence and that that is what brought my theory. The u.s tends to mostly support capitalism. There is barely any room for socialism in current u.s politics. Socialism barely makes it on the news in the u.s.
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This guy is getting downvoted for truth. TT is the only big media platform that consistently promotes socialist policies and openly attacks western status quo. If there are any truly ideological reasons to ban TT it was because of that. We’re being ruled by the oligarchs and their interests were threatened but let’s not kid ourselves - China has their own who’d happily take their place.
I see ZERO discussion about how this is obvious theatre. We are so incapable of standing up to basic manipulation tactics from the right.
trump first started using tiktok as another xenophobic boogeyman, in what was a fairly nuanced situation - trump’s position being completely wrong, but ultimately some truth to the fact that companies run in China inherently have involvement of the Chinese government and thule should be reached, monitored and if abused, access should be removed.
This actual push was always meant to be something to hang on Biden admin either way (because again, some valid points to a potential ban) but in reality trump will now “save” this artificial shutdown to “restore tiktok” and millions of low information voters and non voters alike will think he did something. And in the meantime, whatever the fuck this lemon8 and red whatever apps are will likely be a huge privacy monitoring home as midst will leave things dormant in background as well after tiktok is “restored”.
Again, we are just so I’ll equipped for anything to do with technology.
I agree with you.
And, well, I assume everything coming from the US is
theaterentertainment from the get-go. That’s why I don’t even bother discussing it anymore although I have recently pointed that out about Trump is trying to divert with the Greenland fiasco and the media is being complicit. This is just another one of the pile. I think he’s purposely flooding the media and pushing for Americans’ mental exhaustion.I’d say that’s an understatement. The Chinese government is greatly involved in many aspects of their social media because they don’t have speech protections for individuals nor the press. Xi wants absolute control, so the Chinese government is also involved in other questionable news this week about sponsoring hackers who were primarily targeting the US for gathering intelligence: Millions of Americans caught up in Chinese hacking plot - US. They had state-sponsored malware on 10,000 computers targeting civil rights activists. It doesn’t seem in their interest to play fair, I wonder what their strategy would be if Trump steps in to stroke hes ego.
Also, part of me thinks one of his aides overheard someone talking about banning TikTok for this reason and thought to himself, “Sounds good but it’s too leftist for us to peddle. This would be great to pin on the old geezer!.” and pitched it to Trump as a win-win. It’s absurd, don’t listen to me.
It weirds me out that I can easily see a post is in lemmy.world by the comments
nobody told me federated social media would be federated boofuckinghoo
Lol
I wonder if they’ll sell or go down in flames.
If they sell, it’ll just become overly moderated like Facebook.
If they go down in flames, a bunch of overnight competitors will compete to succeed.
The US is a tiny market compared to the rest of users, why would they ever sell?
It’s their second highest market after Indonesia? They dragged this out as much as possible in congress and in court because its valuable to them.
It’s valuable, it’s not as valuable as the entire rest of the world combined. The US simply doesn’t have the user share to demand the service be sold off.
Did you see the post made by Zucker? They’re going to stop moderating posts, especially those made from, Right wing motherfuckers
They can moderate by boosting certain opinions and downranking others. It doesn’t need fact checkers because it’s platform owner interests and not facts that matter.
That just means they’ll favor the right wing content since it currently benefits them. They will continue to moderate and shadow hide whatever they don’t agree with or are paid to censor.
I know the technicality is that it will be voluntarily stopping service rather than just ending new downloads like the ban says.
But “app will shut down when banned” is almost comically anti-news.
“Utilities threatened to shut off my power so… I will turn off all the lights in protest!”
That’ll show ‘em.
Not the same. If all the users lose access in one go and a prompt allows them to easily send a mail to their representatives then they can put pressure.
If they allow content to flow it could be 12+ months before some users start receiving errors when the ban is out of their mind. They might associate the less US content with the app not being good anymore.
Has anyone in the House or Senate leadership that has received classified briefings on this done anything to oppose it? An email campaign is going to change absolutely nothing.
Right well thats that then, better off do nothing and let your brand lose power than point out the issues impacting your service.
Bye bye.