TheControlled@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 20:18
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Please oh please
SorteKanin@feddit.dk
on 25 Apr 2024 20:23
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So everyone here is probably like “please do it” but I do wonder how the general populace would react. Would people actually miss TikTok if it just disappeared?
NaibofTabr@infosec.pub
on 25 Apr 2024 20:30
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I’m curious about the practicality. IP addresses only roughly correlate to geographic location. Are they going to geofence their app?
Obviously the app can be removed from the US app stores, but I doubt they can prevent sideloading or just using a VPN to get access to a different country’s app store. And what about all the devices that already have it installed? It’s not like it will auto-delete.
fuzzzerd@programming.dev
on 25 Apr 2024 22:02
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it’s not like it will auto-delete.
You’re probably right it won’t, but it definitely could be done by Apple and Google.
NaibofTabr@infosec.pub
on 25 Apr 2024 23:03
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I feel like reaching into individual people’s phones and uninstalling software without their permission would be lawsuit bait.
As I understand, using VPNs to access will be illegal in principle, and the VPNs can be on the hook for stiff penalties.
In practice, it will depend on how zealously the government plays the cat and mouse game. Kind of the same situation as with China and VPNs that bypass the Great Firewall (ironic!).
It won’t matter if there are ways to side load or circumvent, though. 99.9% of users will not be willing to be bothered with such things and the US market would effectively die for the app.
EngineerGaming@feddit.nl
on 26 Apr 2024 12:59
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I would have thought the same if there wasn’t a counterexample right in front of me. We had some major social media blocked, and while there was a noticeable dropoff, they are nowhere near dead. Quite popular, in fact, including among children.
Nope. They'd probably move to YouTube shorts or some other lower quality copy of Vine.
disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 21:16
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They’d reluctantly use Shorts or Slides if there’s no alternative, but realistically it’ll be something new. TikTok’s absence creates a vacuum that could be a huge opportunity for a new platform.
Uranium3006@kbin.social
on 25 Apr 2024 22:10
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Doesn't pixelfed support shirt videos now?
small44@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 23:20
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MdRuckus@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 02:13
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What’s next? Hats? Shoes? The sky’s the limit.
Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.com
on 26 Apr 2024 03:53
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I refuse to watch any vertical short videos but if I never see that bullshit fucking moving logo ever again, I’m happier
exanime@lemmy.today
on 25 Apr 2024 22:37
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Which is in my opinion the actual goal here… The USA talks about free market and crap but usually cannot compete unless they make the rules, set the referees, start with double the money, can’t go to jail and charge triple passing go
Either tiktok becomes an American company or leaves… Ah, the free market has spoken
800XL@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 23:32
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Republicans talk of a completely free market where monopolies are free to flouish. Democrats talk of a free market with regulations to spur competition and keep the consumer safe - like from being sold only rotten meat unless they pay top dollar.
Unfortunately the American gov’t is now just a revolving door of C-level execs to plunder tax dollars for the bottom line and to fuck over they very same people generating the labor and paying the taxes.
Either tiktok becomes an American company or leaves… Ah, the free market has spoken
People keep saying this and I’m struggling to understand where this idea is coming from. The bill isn’t saying that they have to sell TikTok to a US company. They don’t have to sell it to the US government, or an owner in the US. Just divorce the company from explicit control by the Chinese government. Currently, the government can request any data they want from TikTok and they are obligated to provided it. Similarly, business laws in China mean that the government can also push changes down into the company, like a tweak to the algorithm to influence foreign perceptions of a topic for example.
The requirements laid out in this bill are meant to break that obligation and influence. It doesn’t say who should own the company - only who shouldn’t.
exanime@lemmy.today
on 26 Apr 2024 03:01
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Currently, the government can request any data they want from TikTok and they are obligated to provided it.
You mean exactly like all big tech in the USA?
fruitycoder@sh.itjust.works
on 26 Apr 2024 07:14
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They have get a warrent to force getting data and I know of no legal obligation for platforms to change algorithms to promote or demote content. Even the twitter files showed that twitter employees voluntarily agreed to work with federal departments, but had no obligations to
I’m definitely of the opinion that this sort of treatment should be applied to other companies (the actual enforcement of “wellbeing” changes) and that this act is purely selfish when other tech companies are clearly abusing their users, but I also think it’s good to at least start here. I think this sort of uneven hand is shitty, but I see why the US govt would go this route.
I just wish user health was a higher priority than healthy profits. But that’s just not the case. By a long shot.
Sgn@programming.dev
on 26 Apr 2024 08:18
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TikTok creators I follow get miserable amounts of views on YouTube. Shorts algorithm is nowhere near as good as TT and it’s missing loads of features that make TT unique. If those creators were forced to move they’d probably go with Instagram but that’s a poor replacement too.
As a European I’m curious how TT will look like without Yanks. It’s already much more usable after it was banned in India so there’s that.
Because people who want tiktok content watch it in tiktok, and those who don’t don’t like the format in general.
If tiktok started hosting half an hour long documentaries it wouldn’t be any wonder that nobody would watch them, as the userbase doesn’t have the attention span for that and they aren’t scrolling tiktok for that type of content.
I personally have only one user whose shorts I watch, B. Dylan Hollis. And even there I would much rather prefer longer videos, but I’ll take what I can get.
I’m fairly sure that long term TikTok plans to do long form videos too and their current approach has a benefit of getting their foot in the door. No other competitor of YouTube managed to do that before.
The neat thing about TikTok algo is that that they introduce different things and fine tune it to your liking without making things stale. This means those that are there for short form videos will keep on seeing them and their flow won’t be interrupted. Those that are interested in longer ones will be presented with them. It’s already happening but UI really needs refinement as it’s kinda jarring now. It’s still much better than how YouTube is trying to force shorts on their current users though.
EngineerGaming@feddit.nl
on 26 Apr 2024 12:53
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Or, just as likely, would download some VPN and go on.
Heavy users will definitely complain for the first couple of weeks, then they’ll just move on to the next platform.
Womble@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 21:04
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Isnt that pretty damn suspicious? We’d rather just shut down than sell it as a going concern?
Max_P@lemmy.max-p.me
on 25 Apr 2024 22:08
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It’s obviously pretty valuable. How would we feel if say, China decided Microsoft/Google/AWS/Oracle had to sell to a Chinese company on the grounds of national security? They’d rather pull out too, despite China being a very large market too. Or what happens if other countries starts demanding the same?
Pretty sure ByteDance would rather keep their IP.
And if they sell, do they keep the rights for the other countries or it belongs to the US now?
Womble@lemmy.world
on 25 Apr 2024 22:18
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They wouldnt have to sell their IP even just the userbase and videos would be valuable enough to let someone else plug in an algorithm. Then again, i suppose this could all just be bluster.
Truth_Hurts@lemmus.org
on 25 Apr 2024 22:59
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They don’t let our stuff operate there. It’s only fair we treat them the same.
ParetoOptimalDev@lemmy.today
on 26 Apr 2024 04:50
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TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 18:52
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To me this is the biggest thing.
I’m under no illusions that the US is pursuing this for altruistic reasons, but fundamentally I do think it’s ridiculous that China bans western competition, yet the west rolls over and allows Chinese companies, or even the Chinese government, to buy out western companies, to enter the market and compete, and to compete using massive state subsidies or slave labour that kill domestic competition.
IMO it’s entirely fair for a country to say “you’re banning our companies? Ok then we’re banning yours.”
And I do also agree that China uses the data they collect for nefarious purposes. Be it training language models so they can better track and shut down dissenting voices at home, or spreading misinformation amongst other nations. I just wish the US would also clamp down on the privacy policies of domestic companies too.
vinniep@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 00:46
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How would we feel if say, China decided Microsoft/Google/AWS/Oracle had to sell to a Chinese company on the grounds of national security?
But no one is saying that ByteDance has to sell TikTok to a US company. Just divest it to an owner that is not beholden to the Chinese government and obligated to share any and all data upon request. Compared to the legal requirements that China puts on US companies operating in China, this is a pretty tame ask.
yaaaaayPancakes@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 03:57
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Yeah but the 5 Eyes and their friends are everywhere outside of the CCPs borders. So if they really don’t want to let the US have that algorithm, and probe the interfaces the CCP propaganda arm used to access the TikTok backend, there’s few places overall that have a reason to buy it, and can also afford it.
Yaztromo@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 01:25
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AWS already had to effectively do this. AWS only exists in two regions in China because they licensed much of the AWS software to be run by a pair of Chinese-government affiliated ISPs inside China (that is, Amazon doesn’t run AWS in either of its China zones — it’s run by a pair of Chinese companies who license AWS’s software).
This is why the China AWS regions are often quite far behind in terms of functionality from every other region (they either haven’t licensed all the functionality, they don’t keep up-to-date at the same cadence as Amazon, or Amazon is holding certain functions back), and why you can’t really access them from the standard AWS console.
So in effect, Amazon did have to give their software to Chinese-government affiliated companies in order to continue operating in China.
assembly@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 03:35
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Except that is what China already does. Cloud providers with regions in China have to utilize a local partner company which gives access to the whole tech stack. It’s a reason that AWS China regions were always so far behind in service offerings to the rest of the AWS regions.
exanime@lemmy.today
on 25 Apr 2024 22:34
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I think it’s a gamble… Too many people love tiktok (don’t ask me why) that they know the pressure on the gov would be terrible
More importantly, a forced sale (with a time limit to boot) is bound to fetch them the worst deal ever
I think they are calling their bluff
And before anyone comes at me with some stupid fallacy, no I don’t love the Chinese government or I’m trying to imply tiktok has nothing to hide and it’s the source of rainbows and warm sweet buns
They love tiktok because the algorithm works extremely well.
No other social media actually targets you as well as tiktok does. Instagram is constantly trying to shove you in the direction of whatever makes them the most money even if it’s entirely unrelated to your interests. YouTube is clueless to what you like with shorts. Tiktok surfaces new content that is basically unseen anywhere else (thousands of views not millions) that perfectly fits your interests.
Could other platforms do the same thing? Probably: but they’re too short sighted to do so.
exanime@lemmy.today
on 26 Apr 2024 03:04
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Good to know … I have honestly kept away from most social media after a stint in Reddit that pushed me here
I have never had a Facebook, insta, Google whatever social, tiktok, etc so I don’t really get what people like there
Yeah I’ve deleted Facebook and affiliated products since 2017.
Google social never made sense to me but even just for content YouTube does a terrible job showing me what I want to see.
Tiktok had honed in on things I found funny or interesting within an hour of picking it up. And I’m not talking mainstream sports or TV type content, I’m talking niche sub communities and creators with less than 1k followers.
Idk how they’re doing it (besides the obvious data collection) but they’ve got a well tuned algo.
fruitycoder@sh.itjust.works
on 26 Apr 2024 07:10
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YouTube was going down that route but whole terriost pipeline deal durning the hight of the war on terror put big breaks on it. TikTok doesn’t. Its actually wild how vastly different friends of mines tiktoks could be. Just all the most extreme version of anything their into. Had them all asking completely nuts things thinking it was everywhere. Like no sis I don’t about the witches that are supposed to be doing something tonight, that was just an old qanon thread with new dates, wth is boy love anime?
I don’t think “shortsightedness” is the difference. The sheer amount of privileges TikTok requires on your device speaks to Cambridge analytica levels of personal profile knowledge.
Couple that with the endless scroll, hot people doing thirst traps, flashy idiocy, flashing icons hugging the full screen image, no discernible window with controls tempting you to back out or log off…it’s the “perfect” tech product. One that’s endlessly addictive. That’s what makes tech good. They know you better than you know yourself, and they will shamelessly serve you exactly what you didn’t realize you wanted to see.
The sheer amount of privileges TikTok requires on your device
The fuck are you on about?
Tiktok has a total of 0 granted permissions from me.
By default it has the same perms as other similar apps: Google Advertising ID.
That’s it.
You can’t opt out of that: it’s Google.
If you give it a fuck load of perms that’s your fault. By default it has less access than Discord.
You’re just parroting bullshit you’ve heard elsewhere.
I’m a professional Android developer: Tiktok isn’t requesting anything strange. It asks for camera, audio, and storage access when you record a video. That’s exactly what you’d need to ask for: nothing more or less.
I just looked it up again because you made me second guess myself. But i distinctly remembered a laundry list of permissions on the App Store. My lemmy client isn’t letting me upload he screen grabs for some reason, but the detailed tracking information took up four screenshots. So…you might wanna double check that.
It’s the second. But the Apple App Store alerts you to it reading up browsing history, your physical address, “other user contact info” besides name, phone, email, and physical address, whatever that could mean, as well as your “other financial info” besides your payment to them, “other diagnostic data” besides crash, performance data, and app use…
Maybe this is just a matter of opinion but those few things alone are way too much. But hey, you do you.
Are you talking about the App Privacy page specifically?
Because that page is about as useful as “known to the State of California to cause cancer”
Any social media with advertising will have similar alerts as to what it might be collecting.
How would it be collecting that you might ask?
It’s not on your phone: Your browser and your apps are sandboxed from each other. They cannot read from each other. It’s a constant pain in the ass for session persistence, you end up having to use wonky nonce patterns to maintain sessions from app to browser & vice versa.
They’re collecting it from advertising ids that are on your browser. It’s the Google Ad Api - That’s it.
Go ahead, look at Instagram or Youtube. They’ll have the same laundry list of “Browsing history, Physical Address” etc.
TikTok isn’t conjuring that from thin air - It’s just that it, like any other advertising app, is using the publicly available data about you to advertise.
Again a side by side:
Which one is TikTok and which one is Instagram?
<img alt="" src="https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/b9a60d42-bac1-4c4d-a500-2827415777b0.webp">
I really wish I could post those pictures. I opened the “learn more” page on the App Store. It does list some of the same info under a few different headers, but I take that to mean it’s more detailed info to apply to their multiple tracking desires.
As soon as a user starts using TikTok, the company begins building a profile about them, including their interests, political leanings, sexuality, and every other variable that could impact the selection of videos they see. TikTok also collects information about users’ keystroke patterns, location information, browser history, and even biometric information (face and voice print).
I’m not a social media person, so I was never going to use the app anyway, but I’m also pretty strict about what apps I’ll download. It’s probably a security blanket, but I try to do what I can. I’ve changed my mind about downloading a couple of apps that required way fewer permissions. So maybe my opinion is different than others’.
My point here is less that TikTok is totally cool with privacy (they’re not)
It’s that tiktok is just as invasive as all other mainstream social media but they provide a better service than any other social media.
That’s it: They do more with the exact same.
You can drop instagram straight into that sentence and it reads the same. Except Facebook tracks you even when you don’t have an account.
As soon as a user starts using Instagram, the company begins building a profile about them, including their interests, political leanings, sexuality, and every other variable that could impact the selection of videos they see.
I see. Maybe that’s true. I don’t think we even know the true extent of their snooping. Any of them. It’s probably much more extensive and creepy than any of us could ever know.
Although, I do think them providing “better” service is subjective. It’s basically vine, right? Vine had an “explore” page, right? I would definitely agree they provide a more stimulating service than any other social media company.
But if you asked them their mission statement, their answer would be “providing customers with a great experience.” Though, if you could actually get the non-PR answer, their goal is to maximize engagement with an app people have a hard time turning off, while maximizing profits by dominating the data broker market.
Would you say they’re providing customers a better experience? Or that they’re the most effective social media company? I’d argue that probably every new iteration of social media, and every year they exist, they get more invasive. They’re finding new ways to streamline their profit centers. And they’re…free apps. So….
That’s all I’m saying. I don’t know for certain who’s more invasive, but I will say it’s a race to the bottom and we’ll never know who actually won until there’s a whistle blower. That’s…not a good sign. I’m sure we can agree on that much.
Although, I do think them providing “better” service is subjective.
Sure, better is always subjective
But there’s a reason it’s way more popular for short form video than anyone else despite coming after them.
It’s basically vine, right? Vine had an “explore” page, right?
Sorta. It’s short form video but vine was locked to 7 seconds. TT is anything up to 3 minutes.
But beyond vine: the “for you page” of Tiktok is an algorithmic beast unlike anything else. It is miles better at training to your likes than anyone else manages.
It seems like their main money plan besides ads is shopping. That’s been their major push for a year or so now.
With social media companies and ad tech in general it’s safe to assume that they’re all merciless and cutthroat. They will do anything to profile you better, short of the existentially illegal shit (IE the company would cease to exist if they were caught. Think breaking into your house).
That’s why it’s always hilarious when people tout whatsapp being e2e encrypted
the “for you” page of TikTok is an algorithmic beast unlike anything else. It is miles better at training to your likes than anyone else manages.
And maybe this is me being a pessimist and something of a Luddite lite, but I take that to mean the data they’re extracting from users is way more invasive than other companies.
They’re not hand selecting things they think you’d like, like you said, it’s an incredibly advanced algorithm that is scientifically creating the most effective content service they can.
And yeah, def agree people who trust WhatsApp are dumb af. I don’t trust meta any more than I trust the people who own TikTok’s algorithm.
I think we’re basically saying the same thing, but just looking at it differently. I take what you’re saying to mean they’re more invasive. You are more or less saying they’re as invasive as any other SM company, and they’re all pretty much neck and neck.
I’d agree in some senses, but think TikTok has mastered that profiling to the heights anyone could even imagine. And I also think, with ties to the Chinese govt—a ruthlessly authoritarian state—that it doesn’t bode well for user privacy, probably going beyond that threshold you mentioned. I would say the exact same thing if Facebook were owned by the US govt and was operating in China, Russia, etc.
Yeah seems like we’re just of different opinions there.
I firmly believe that American companies have excruciating detail on every single user, as well as most non-users. That’s how they can do things like predict pregnancy before the rest of the family has been told…
And that was Target more than a decade ago.
And I also think, with ties to the Chinese govt
It’s worth noting that ByteDance has a board that is 3/5ths American. The company has a communist committee like all Chinese megacorps.
China has blocked Youtube because it contained content around Free Tibet & Tienanmen Square. American Congress has decided to ban Tiktok because it might have content that China wants people to see (maybe). There is no credible reason why besides “No totally, trust me it’s a problem”.
Right. I mean, I’m no fan of china. I’m no fan of the US govt either. But I would say that China banning YT because it told the true story of Chinese oppression and the US trying to ban TikTok because it might be used to sway American opinion are starkly different…I mean, there have been coordinated disinformation campaigns in recent years. It’s not completely crazy to imagine china would use this incredibly powerful tool to spread their influence. Their track record isn’t amazing.
Also, yeah, most definitely, the data broker situation is waaaayyy the fuck out of control. It’s terrifying. Us companies are absolutely not innocent. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that US companies were the first to really “create” this new market. I haven’t looked that up though.
Sl00k@programming.dev
on 26 Apr 2024 01:02
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The article talks about why they’d prefer to shut down if you take their word it. Essentially the US is such a tiny portion of ByteDances revenue, it would be more optimal to shut down then to risk the sale of their algorithm. Assuming they’re using relatively similar algorithms on Douyin, and they don’t want whoever they sell to to turn around and sell to their Chinese competition, which is where the real money is being made for ByteDance.
DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe
on 26 Apr 2024 01:52
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Bullshit, they’re bluffing at best.
Average revenue per user is a pretty common industry benchmark, and the US absolutely slaughters the rest of the world. We’re the fat, dumb, brainwashed cows the advertisers can’t get enough of.
Is that really justified, or an example of selection bias?
Does it matter to a shareholder?
HessiaNerd@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 03:56
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Maybe the CCP is paying the difference?
EssentialCoffee@midwest.social
on 26 Apr 2024 12:30
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Not really. It depends on what it is. There are entire games and items that aren’t available in the US, but make a killing in Asia.
On that game, the US comes in at 7th, is less than half of the top country (Japan) and is notably behind Switzerland.
For Tik Tok specifically, we can look at their annual reports.
Let’s look at average annual users per region. 682M in Asia Pacific, which does not include China. 192M in North America.
China’s numbers are 750M daily.
I don’t think most of their money comes from the US.
DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe
on 26 Apr 2024 13:15
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There’s a reason you couldn’t actually talk about the ARPU, and that’s because an American user is worth literally 7x more than a Chinese user on average. Which is why TikTok had a revenue of 16.1b in 2023, with a growing user base, and ByteDance’s total revenue was 40.8b.
Davidchan@lemmynsfw.com
on 26 Apr 2024 06:42
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Makes the children screaming we are taking their toy away seem even more oblivious when the billion dollar corporation gives absolutely zero shits about losing the business.
We? Are you in congress being lobbied by Alphabet and Meta?
CriticalMiss@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 12:19
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It’s a scare tactic. You as a customer won’t care if the business gets a new owner but if they threaten to shut down all the kids they have will start kicking and screaming to make the government dial back the decision.
TwilightVulpine@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 20:57
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No?
The way you are speaking it’s as if they mean to close down the whole thing. There is a whole rest of the world for them to operate in. Sure losing the US market would be a huge detriment, but the owners still might rather have it everywhere else, than keep it running in the US in someone else’s hands.
Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 00:14
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They aren’t being forced to sell their operations in the entire world, just the US. So, doesn’t it make better financial sense, if all legal options to keep control fail, that they sell their US operation to another company, and at least get billions of dollars before exit, than to just lose the market and get not billions?
wildcardology@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 01:22
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But what if the US version becomes a different version than the rest of the world’s? What if the rest of the world wants that version and demands it?
Kolanaki@yiffit.net
on 27 Apr 2024 03:03
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Then they change it to match.
wildcardology@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 04:00
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How does that work? 1 app 2 companies. Who will follow whom?
Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 05:12
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They have a leg up, they would have to use their early footing to compete. If they go, the vacuum of their loss of presence will open a spot for an american tech company to copy them. Either way, they are going to get competition from an american tech company. Nothing they are doing is esoteric in a way that would make them hard to copy. There really is no secret sauce, so to speak, in the software. If they are doing it to hide something then then it lends credence to the US’s accusations, at least it leaves a grey area for that speculation. This gives the US a big avenue to push that they are right and everyone should be cautious of their media business.
Maggoty@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 04:33
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They don’t want to seed a competitor with their tech.
Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 05:15
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They are going to get one when a western tech company copies them to fill the vacuum they left. Their only real advantage is their leg-up with their earlier footing. There is nothing particularly interesting in their software, it’s easy to copy, and someone likely will. If they do not get a copycat, their crowd will move on to some other thing and, being in the same industry, will still be a competitor.
TheRealKuni@lemmy.world
on 27 Apr 2024 17:48
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They are going to get one when a western tech company copies them to fill the vacuum they left.
When? Instagram/Facebook Reels are already a blatant copy. And YouTube Shorts is trying.
PresidentCamacho@lemm.ee
on 27 Apr 2024 18:16
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They don’t want to compete with tiktok, they want them gone so they win without trying to make their own service better, which they could do, but they don’t want to change what likely ends up being a more lucrative algorithm for them if they aren’t dealing with competition. You know, American free market economics 🙄
PresidentCamacho@lemm.ee
on 27 Apr 2024 18:13
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A thing never mentioned in these debates is that noone in the world is buying tiktok without buying the underlying algorithm, the same algorithm the app runs on worldwide, the algorithm is the special sauce. They are not going to sell the basis for their app just for a single payday in the US market, which after buying it, they could rebrand and then once successful in the US, compete in the global market against tiktok but with the income of the most lucrative app market in the world behind them. It’s an extremely stupid business move.
nick@midwest.social
on 25 Apr 2024 22:25
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Good.
inclementimmigrant@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 00:07
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I mean I’d be all fucking for it and honestly take the rest of facebook with you if you could.
fiercekitten@lemm.ee
on 27 Apr 2024 05:40
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Yes, but this is not the way. The US needs federal privacy laws that would regulate all these tech companies. Instead, congress shows that they don’t care about the privacy of US Americans; they just don’t trust China.
Then, in one of the biggest FUs ever to the constitution, they expand the FISA amendment.
ikidd@lemmy.world
on 26 Apr 2024 01:14
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Yah yah, sure sure.
IvanOverdrive@lemm.ee
on 25 Apr 2024 20:10
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This just confirms the worst case scenario for me. This might be posturing, but it’s far more likely ByteDance can’t reveal how much command the CCP has over the data.
HauntedBucket@lemm.ee
on 25 Apr 2024 20:35
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Oh hey, me too
AnAnonymous@lemm.ee
on 25 Apr 2024 22:04
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China should force Apple to sell to stop them of collecting Chinese people information for the US govt.
Mastengwe@lemm.ee
on 26 Apr 2024 00:41
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Can’t fucking wait.
AceFuzzLord@lemm.ee
on 26 Apr 2024 01:30
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Well, as someone I watch online pretty much said, this could lead to other countries banning it if they don’t sell (as to whether that actually happens, I can’t say since I’m nowhere near qualified enough to make that call). I have my own reasons for hoping for a ban outside of wanting most short form content being banned because of attention span draining brain rot, but this is definitely shaping up to be an interesting development.
What’s the win here? For Facebook and cable news? Because it looks like another example of the American government strong all over the 1st amendment rights of its citizens because they don’t like what they’re taking about
The main win is banning a content recommendation algorithm that is influenced by the CCP. A secondary win is reducing consumption of short form content. A tertiary win is eliminating that God awful narrator voice.
There’s no valid 1st amendment argument here. This doesn’t ban American voices, that can continue to be shared on alternative platforms, it bans the CCP Government’s propaganda inserting itself in American media consumption.
fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee
on 27 Apr 2024 22:37
collapse
Well said, although I think the first point is the only one that justified banning it.
I mean…if operating in a country meant selling your US business, you’re probably not going to say “oh gods someone please buy us 🙏”, if you want a big payout…
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Please oh please
So everyone here is probably like “please do it” but I do wonder how the general populace would react. Would people actually miss TikTok if it just disappeared?
I’m curious about the practicality. IP addresses only roughly correlate to geographic location. Are they going to geofence their app?
Obviously the app can be removed from the US app stores, but I doubt they can prevent sideloading or just using a VPN to get access to a different country’s app store. And what about all the devices that already have it installed? It’s not like it will auto-delete.
You’re probably right it won’t, but it definitely could be done by Apple and Google.
I feel like reaching into individual people’s phones and uninstalling software without their permission would be lawsuit bait.
.
As I understand, using VPNs to access will be illegal in principle, and the VPNs can be on the hook for stiff penalties.
In practice, it will depend on how zealously the government plays the cat and mouse game. Kind of the same situation as with China and VPNs that bypass the Great Firewall (ironic!).
It won’t matter if there are ways to side load or circumvent, though. 99.9% of users will not be willing to be bothered with such things and the US market would effectively die for the app.
I would have thought the same if there wasn’t a counterexample right in front of me. We had some major social media blocked, and while there was a noticeable dropoff, they are nowhere near dead. Quite popular, in fact, including among children.
Nope. They'd probably move to YouTube shorts or some other lower quality copy of Vine.
They’d reluctantly use Shorts or Slides if there’s no alternative, but realistically it’ll be something new. TikTok’s absence creates a vacuum that could be a huge opportunity for a new platform.
Doesn't pixelfed support shirt videos now?
Not out yet
We might even get pants videos in 2025.
What’s next? Hats? Shoes? The sky’s the limit.
I refuse to watch any vertical short videos but if I never see that bullshit fucking moving logo ever again, I’m happier
Which is in my opinion the actual goal here… The USA talks about free market and crap but usually cannot compete unless they make the rules, set the referees, start with double the money, can’t go to jail and charge triple passing go
Either tiktok becomes an American company or leaves… Ah, the free market has spoken
Republicans talk of a completely free market where monopolies are free to flouish. Democrats talk of a free market with regulations to spur competition and keep the consumer safe - like from being sold only rotten meat unless they pay top dollar.
Unfortunately the American gov’t is now just a revolving door of C-level execs to plunder tax dollars for the bottom line and to fuck over they very same people generating the labor and paying the taxes.
People keep saying this and I’m struggling to understand where this idea is coming from. The bill isn’t saying that they have to sell TikTok to a US company. They don’t have to sell it to the US government, or an owner in the US. Just divorce the company from explicit control by the Chinese government. Currently, the government can request any data they want from TikTok and they are obligated to provided it. Similarly, business laws in China mean that the government can also push changes down into the company, like a tweak to the algorithm to influence foreign perceptions of a topic for example.
The requirements laid out in this bill are meant to break that obligation and influence. It doesn’t say who should own the company - only who shouldn’t.
You mean exactly like all big tech in the USA?
They have get a warrent to force getting data and I know of no legal obligation for platforms to change algorithms to promote or demote content. Even the twitter files showed that twitter employees voluntarily agreed to work with federal departments, but had no obligations to
This is important for people to understand.
I’m definitely of the opinion that this sort of treatment should be applied to other companies (the actual enforcement of “wellbeing” changes) and that this act is purely selfish when other tech companies are clearly abusing their users, but I also think it’s good to at least start here. I think this sort of uneven hand is shitty, but I see why the US govt would go this route.
I just wish user health was a higher priority than healthy profits. But that’s just not the case. By a long shot.
They are going to reels
TikTok creators I follow get miserable amounts of views on YouTube. Shorts algorithm is nowhere near as good as TT and it’s missing loads of features that make TT unique. If those creators were forced to move they’d probably go with Instagram but that’s a poor replacement too.
As a European I’m curious how TT will look like without Yanks. It’s already much more usable after it was banned in India so there’s that.
Because people who want tiktok content watch it in tiktok, and those who don’t don’t like the format in general.
If tiktok started hosting half an hour long documentaries it wouldn’t be any wonder that nobody would watch them, as the userbase doesn’t have the attention span for that and they aren’t scrolling tiktok for that type of content.
I personally have only one user whose shorts I watch, B. Dylan Hollis. And even there I would much rather prefer longer videos, but I’ll take what I can get.
I’m fairly sure that long term TikTok plans to do long form videos too and their current approach has a benefit of getting their foot in the door. No other competitor of YouTube managed to do that before.
The neat thing about TikTok algo is that that they introduce different things and fine tune it to your liking without making things stale. This means those that are there for short form videos will keep on seeing them and their flow won’t be interrupted. Those that are interested in longer ones will be presented with them. It’s already happening but UI really needs refinement as it’s kinda jarring now. It’s still much better than how YouTube is trying to force shorts on their current users though.
Or, just as likely, would download some VPN and go on.
Heavy users will definitely complain for the first couple of weeks, then they’ll just move on to the next platform.
Isnt that pretty damn suspicious? We’d rather just shut down than sell it as a going concern?
It’s obviously pretty valuable. How would we feel if say, China decided Microsoft/Google/AWS/Oracle had to sell to a Chinese company on the grounds of national security? They’d rather pull out too, despite China being a very large market too. Or what happens if other countries starts demanding the same?
Pretty sure ByteDance would rather keep their IP.
And if they sell, do they keep the rights for the other countries or it belongs to the US now?
They wouldnt have to sell their IP even just the userbase and videos would be valuable enough to let someone else plug in an algorithm. Then again, i suppose this could all just be bluster.
They don’t let our stuff operate there. It’s only fair we treat them the same.
But we aren’t them… right?
Paradox of tolerance, blah blah
To me this is the biggest thing.
I’m under no illusions that the US is pursuing this for altruistic reasons, but fundamentally I do think it’s ridiculous that China bans western competition, yet the west rolls over and allows Chinese companies, or even the Chinese government, to buy out western companies, to enter the market and compete, and to compete using massive state subsidies or slave labour that kill domestic competition.
IMO it’s entirely fair for a country to say “you’re banning our companies? Ok then we’re banning yours.”
And I do also agree that China uses the data they collect for nefarious purposes. Be it training language models so they can better track and shut down dissenting voices at home, or spreading misinformation amongst other nations. I just wish the US would also clamp down on the privacy policies of domestic companies too.
But no one is saying that ByteDance has to sell TikTok to a US company. Just divest it to an owner that is not beholden to the Chinese government and obligated to share any and all data upon request. Compared to the legal requirements that China puts on US companies operating in China, this is a pretty tame ask.
Yeah but the 5 Eyes and their friends are everywhere outside of the CCPs borders. So if they really don’t want to let the US have that algorithm, and probe the interfaces the CCP propaganda arm used to access the TikTok backend, there’s few places overall that have a reason to buy it, and can also afford it.
AWS already had to effectively do this. AWS only exists in two regions in China because they licensed much of the AWS software to be run by a pair of Chinese-government affiliated ISPs inside China (that is, Amazon doesn’t run AWS in either of its China zones — it’s run by a pair of Chinese companies who license AWS’s software).
This is why the China AWS regions are often quite far behind in terms of functionality from every other region (they either haven’t licensed all the functionality, they don’t keep up-to-date at the same cadence as Amazon, or Amazon is holding certain functions back), and why you can’t really access them from the standard AWS console.
So in effect, Amazon did have to give their software to Chinese-government affiliated companies in order to continue operating in China.
Except that is what China already does. Cloud providers with regions in China have to utilize a local partner company which gives access to the whole tech stack. It’s a reason that AWS China regions were always so far behind in service offerings to the rest of the AWS regions.
I think it’s a gamble… Too many people love tiktok (don’t ask me why) that they know the pressure on the gov would be terrible
More importantly, a forced sale (with a time limit to boot) is bound to fetch them the worst deal ever
I think they are calling their bluff
And before anyone comes at me with some stupid fallacy, no I don’t love the Chinese government or I’m trying to imply tiktok has nothing to hide and it’s the source of rainbows and warm sweet buns
They love tiktok because the algorithm works extremely well.
No other social media actually targets you as well as tiktok does. Instagram is constantly trying to shove you in the direction of whatever makes them the most money even if it’s entirely unrelated to your interests. YouTube is clueless to what you like with shorts. Tiktok surfaces new content that is basically unseen anywhere else (thousands of views not millions) that perfectly fits your interests.
Could other platforms do the same thing? Probably: but they’re too short sighted to do so.
Good to know … I have honestly kept away from most social media after a stint in Reddit that pushed me here
I have never had a Facebook, insta, Google whatever social, tiktok, etc so I don’t really get what people like there
Yeah I’ve deleted Facebook and affiliated products since 2017.
Google social never made sense to me but even just for content YouTube does a terrible job showing me what I want to see.
Tiktok had honed in on things I found funny or interesting within an hour of picking it up. And I’m not talking mainstream sports or TV type content, I’m talking niche sub communities and creators with less than 1k followers.
Idk how they’re doing it (besides the obvious data collection) but they’ve got a well tuned algo.
YouTube was going down that route but whole terriost pipeline deal durning the hight of the war on terror put big breaks on it. TikTok doesn’t. Its actually wild how vastly different friends of mines tiktoks could be. Just all the most extreme version of anything their into. Had them all asking completely nuts things thinking it was everywhere. Like no sis I don’t about the witches that are supposed to be doing something tonight, that was just an old qanon thread with new dates, wth is boy love anime?
I don’t think “shortsightedness” is the difference. The sheer amount of privileges TikTok requires on your device speaks to Cambridge analytica levels of personal profile knowledge.
Couple that with the endless scroll, hot people doing thirst traps, flashy idiocy, flashing icons hugging the full screen image, no discernible window with controls tempting you to back out or log off…it’s the “perfect” tech product. One that’s endlessly addictive. That’s what makes tech good. They know you better than you know yourself, and they will shamelessly serve you exactly what you didn’t realize you wanted to see.
The fuck are you on about?
Tiktok has a total of 0 granted permissions from me.
By default it has the same perms as other similar apps: Google Advertising ID.
That’s it.
You can’t opt out of that: it’s Google.
If you give it a fuck load of perms that’s your fault. By default it has less access than Discord.
You’re just parroting bullshit you’ve heard elsewhere.
I’m a professional Android developer: Tiktok isn’t requesting anything strange. It asks for camera, audio, and storage access when you record a video. That’s exactly what you’d need to ask for: nothing more or less.
lol k.
I just looked it up again because you made me second guess myself. But i distinctly remembered a laundry list of permissions on the App Store. My lemmy client isn’t letting me upload he screen grabs for some reason, but the detailed tracking information took up four screenshots. So…you might wanna double check that.
Let’s play a fun game:
Which of the following 2 screenshots is TikTok’s permissions?
<img alt="" src="https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/2c7d7e23-c82e-4d65-8461-629df474c2ce.webp"> <img alt="" src="https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/0f61670b-0d4d-476f-909e-8eda10385a19.webp">
Is it the one that can prevent the phone from sleeping and runs at startup? The one that sends sticky broadcasts?
Or is it the one that accesses the AdId Api?
I’ll give you a hint: I already told you which one it is.
It’s the second. But the Apple App Store alerts you to it reading up browsing history, your physical address, “other user contact info” besides name, phone, email, and physical address, whatever that could mean, as well as your “other financial info” besides your payment to them, “other diagnostic data” besides crash, performance data, and app use…
Maybe this is just a matter of opinion but those few things alone are way too much. But hey, you do you.
Are you talking about the App Privacy page specifically?
Because that page is about as useful as “known to the State of California to cause cancer”
Any social media with advertising will have similar alerts as to what it might be collecting.
How would it be collecting that you might ask?
It’s not on your phone: Your browser and your apps are sandboxed from each other. They cannot read from each other. It’s a constant pain in the ass for session persistence, you end up having to use wonky nonce patterns to maintain sessions from app to browser & vice versa.
They’re collecting it from advertising ids that are on your browser. It’s the Google Ad Api - That’s it.
Go ahead, look at Instagram or Youtube. They’ll have the same laundry list of “Browsing history, Physical Address” etc.
TikTok isn’t conjuring that from thin air - It’s just that it, like any other advertising app, is using the publicly available data about you to advertise.
Again a side by side:
Which one is TikTok and which one is Instagram? <img alt="" src="https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/b9a60d42-bac1-4c4d-a500-2827415777b0.webp">
<img alt="" src="https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/a25d3b16-1b37-41f0-83c7-f631f8304c48.webp">
TikTok isn’t doing anything that the other apps aren’t also doing - The other apps are just fucking awful at knowing what you want to see.
I really wish I could post those pictures. I opened the “learn more” page on the App Store. It does list some of the same info under a few different headers, but I take that to mean it’s more detailed info to apply to their multiple tracking desires.
thequill.ca/…/five-reasons-why-tiktok-is-a-privac…
I’m not a social media person, so I was never going to use the app anyway, but I’m also pretty strict about what apps I’ll download. It’s probably a security blanket, but I try to do what I can. I’ve changed my mind about downloading a couple of apps that required way fewer permissions. So maybe my opinion is different than others’.
My point here is less that TikTok is totally cool with privacy (they’re not)
It’s that tiktok is just as invasive as all other mainstream social media but they provide a better service than any other social media.
That’s it: They do more with the exact same.
You can drop instagram straight into that sentence and it reads the same. Except Facebook tracks you even when you don’t have an account.
I see. Maybe that’s true. I don’t think we even know the true extent of their snooping. Any of them. It’s probably much more extensive and creepy than any of us could ever know.
Although, I do think them providing “better” service is subjective. It’s basically vine, right? Vine had an “explore” page, right? I would definitely agree they provide a more stimulating service than any other social media company.
But if you asked them their mission statement, their answer would be “providing customers with a great experience.” Though, if you could actually get the non-PR answer, their goal is to maximize engagement with an app people have a hard time turning off, while maximizing profits by dominating the data broker market.
Would you say they’re providing customers a better experience? Or that they’re the most effective social media company? I’d argue that probably every new iteration of social media, and every year they exist, they get more invasive. They’re finding new ways to streamline their profit centers. And they’re…free apps. So….
That’s all I’m saying. I don’t know for certain who’s more invasive, but I will say it’s a race to the bottom and we’ll never know who actually won until there’s a whistle blower. That’s…not a good sign. I’m sure we can agree on that much.
Sure, better is always subjective
But there’s a reason it’s way more popular for short form video than anyone else despite coming after them.
Sorta. It’s short form video but vine was locked to 7 seconds. TT is anything up to 3 minutes.
But beyond vine: the “for you page” of Tiktok is an algorithmic beast unlike anything else. It is miles better at training to your likes than anyone else manages.
It seems like their main money plan besides ads is shopping. That’s been their major push for a year or so now.
With social media companies and ad tech in general it’s safe to assume that they’re all merciless and cutthroat. They will do anything to profile you better, short of the existentially illegal shit (IE the company would cease to exist if they were caught. Think breaking into your house).
That’s why it’s always hilarious when people tout whatsapp being e2e encrypted
And maybe this is me being a pessimist and something of a Luddite lite, but I take that to mean the data they’re extracting from users is way more invasive than other companies.
They’re not hand selecting things they think you’d like, like you said, it’s an incredibly advanced algorithm that is scientifically creating the most effective content service they can.
And yeah, def agree people who trust WhatsApp are dumb af. I don’t trust meta any more than I trust the people who own TikTok’s algorithm.
I think we’re basically saying the same thing, but just looking at it differently. I take what you’re saying to mean they’re more invasive. You are more or less saying they’re as invasive as any other SM company, and they’re all pretty much neck and neck.
I’d agree in some senses, but think TikTok has mastered that profiling to the heights anyone could even imagine. And I also think, with ties to the Chinese govt—a ruthlessly authoritarian state—that it doesn’t bode well for user privacy, probably going beyond that threshold you mentioned. I would say the exact same thing if Facebook were owned by the US govt and was operating in China, Russia, etc.
Yeah seems like we’re just of different opinions there.
I firmly believe that American companies have excruciating detail on every single user, as well as most non-users. That’s how they can do things like predict pregnancy before the rest of the family has been told…
And that was Target more than a decade ago.
It’s worth noting that ByteDance has a board that is 3/5ths American. The company has a communist committee like all Chinese megacorps.
China has blocked Youtube because it contained content around Free Tibet & Tienanmen Square. American Congress has decided to ban Tiktok because it might have content that China wants people to see (maybe). There is no credible reason why besides “No totally, trust me it’s a problem”.
Right. I mean, I’m no fan of china. I’m no fan of the US govt either. But I would say that China banning YT because it told the true story of Chinese oppression and the US trying to ban TikTok because it might be used to sway American opinion are starkly different…I mean, there have been coordinated disinformation campaigns in recent years. It’s not completely crazy to imagine china would use this incredibly powerful tool to spread their influence. Their track record isn’t amazing.
Also, yeah, most definitely, the data broker situation is waaaayyy the fuck out of control. It’s terrifying. Us companies are absolutely not innocent. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that US companies were the first to really “create” this new market. I haven’t looked that up though.
The article talks about why they’d prefer to shut down if you take their word it. Essentially the US is such a tiny portion of ByteDances revenue, it would be more optimal to shut down then to risk the sale of their algorithm. Assuming they’re using relatively similar algorithms on Douyin, and they don’t want whoever they sell to to turn around and sell to their Chinese competition, which is where the real money is being made for ByteDance.
Bullshit, they’re bluffing at best.
Average revenue per user is a pretty common industry benchmark, and the US absolutely slaughters the rest of the world. We’re the fat, dumb, brainwashed cows the advertisers can’t get enough of.
Is that really justified, or an example of selection bias?
Does it matter to a shareholder?
Maybe the CCP is paying the difference?
Not really. It depends on what it is. There are entire games and items that aren’t available in the US, but make a killing in Asia.
Like, here’s Genshin Impact numbers from 2023.
On that game, the US comes in at 7th, is less than half of the top country (Japan) and is notably behind Switzerland.
For Tik Tok specifically, we can look at their annual reports.
Let’s look at average annual users per region. 682M in Asia Pacific, which does not include China. 192M in North America.
China’s numbers are 750M daily.
I don’t think most of their money comes from the US.
There’s a reason you couldn’t actually talk about the ARPU, and that’s because an American user is worth literally 7x more than a Chinese user on average. Which is why TikTok had a revenue of 16.1b in 2023, with a growing user base, and ByteDance’s total revenue was 40.8b.
Makes the children screaming we are taking their toy away seem even more oblivious when the billion dollar corporation gives absolutely zero shits about losing the business.
We? Are you in congress being lobbied by Alphabet and Meta?
It’s a scare tactic. You as a customer won’t care if the business gets a new owner but if they threaten to shut down all the kids they have will start kicking and screaming to make the government dial back the decision.
No?
The way you are speaking it’s as if they mean to close down the whole thing. There is a whole rest of the world for them to operate in. Sure losing the US market would be a huge detriment, but the owners still might rather have it everywhere else, than keep it running in the US in someone else’s hands.
They aren’t being forced to sell their operations in the entire world, just the US. So, doesn’t it make better financial sense, if all legal options to keep control fail, that they sell their US operation to another company, and at least get billions of dollars before exit, than to just lose the market and get not billions?
But what if the US version becomes a different version than the rest of the world’s? What if the rest of the world wants that version and demands it?
Then they change it to match.
How does that work? 1 app 2 companies. Who will follow whom?
They have a leg up, they would have to use their early footing to compete. If they go, the vacuum of their loss of presence will open a spot for an american tech company to copy them. Either way, they are going to get competition from an american tech company. Nothing they are doing is esoteric in a way that would make them hard to copy. There really is no secret sauce, so to speak, in the software. If they are doing it to hide something then then it lends credence to the US’s accusations, at least it leaves a grey area for that speculation. This gives the US a big avenue to push that they are right and everyone should be cautious of their media business.
They don’t want to seed a competitor with their tech.
They are going to get one when a western tech company copies them to fill the vacuum they left. Their only real advantage is their leg-up with their earlier footing. There is nothing particularly interesting in their software, it’s easy to copy, and someone likely will. If they do not get a copycat, their crowd will move on to some other thing and, being in the same industry, will still be a competitor.
When? Instagram/Facebook Reels are already a blatant copy. And YouTube Shorts is trying.
They don’t want to compete with tiktok, they want them gone so they win without trying to make their own service better, which they could do, but they don’t want to change what likely ends up being a more lucrative algorithm for them if they aren’t dealing with competition. You know, American free market economics 🙄
A thing never mentioned in these debates is that noone in the world is buying tiktok without buying the underlying algorithm, the same algorithm the app runs on worldwide, the algorithm is the special sauce. They are not going to sell the basis for their app just for a single payday in the US market, which after buying it, they could rebrand and then once successful in the US, compete in the global market against tiktok but with the income of the most lucrative app market in the world behind them. It’s an extremely stupid business move.
Good.
I mean I’d be all fucking for it and honestly take the rest of facebook with you if you could.
Yes, but this is not the way. The US needs federal privacy laws that would regulate all these tech companies. Instead, congress shows that they don’t care about the privacy of US Americans; they just don’t trust China.
Then, in one of the biggest FUs ever to the constitution, they expand the FISA amendment.
Yah yah, sure sure.
This just confirms the worst case scenario for me. This might be posturing, but it’s far more likely ByteDance can’t reveal how much command the CCP has over the data.
Oh hey, me too
China should force Apple to sell to stop them of collecting Chinese people information for the US govt.
Can’t fucking wait.
Well, as someone I watch online pretty much said, this could lead to other countries banning it if they don’t sell (as to whether that actually happens, I can’t say since I’m nowhere near qualified enough to make that call). I have my own reasons for hoping for a ban outside of wanting most short form content being banned because of attention span draining brain rot, but this is definitely shaping up to be an interesting development.
.
A win is a win
What’s the win here? For Facebook and cable news? Because it looks like another example of the American government strong all over the 1st amendment rights of its citizens because they don’t like what they’re taking about
The main win is banning a content recommendation algorithm that is influenced by the CCP. A secondary win is reducing consumption of short form content. A tertiary win is eliminating that God awful narrator voice.
There’s no valid 1st amendment argument here. This doesn’t ban American voices, that can continue to be shared on alternative platforms, it bans the CCP Government’s propaganda inserting itself in American media consumption.
Well said, although I think the first point is the only one that justified banning it.
Agreed 👍
Good luck to both of us, friend.
I mean…if operating in a country meant selling your US business, you’re probably not going to say “oh gods someone please buy us 🙏”, if you want a big payout…