The Banning of TikTok

In what must surely be a candidate for the largest attack on freedom of expression in its history, it appears that moves are afoot to ban TikTok in the United States, a platform with 170 million users there.

https://edition.cnn.com/politics/live-news/tiktok-ban-bill-house-vote-03-13-24/index.html

The usual 'national security' justification is used to railroad it through.

And apart from anything else, with Joe Biden struggling amongst young voters this seems like another particularly stupid self-own.

This is a huge overreach seeking to make it harder to get an app because socialism bad, and what is even more telling is that the people doing it have no real idea how the internet works because simply banning it from places like the app store would only make it more popular while also making it less secure as there would be no overseeing the apps distribution at all by commercial entities we know of.

This is the problem with elderly and ignorant about tech people trying to make regulations. we cannot lieberman our way through supposed internet off switches. This is old stupid people trying to ban something they fear because it was used to promote their younger and more savvy opponents in elections. To think old joe biden will know this is is bad and not going to work is folly as he clearly can't use social media apps and is probably the type to have a flip phone because a smart phone is just too much for him. In this case I would say Trump is probably more aware of the situation than old joe. That is because Trump has embraced social media and obviously uses it and worries about it.

Joe had better watch out because going old grumpy fascist and banning the kid's apps because he is an old asshole who thinks he knows everything is really going to hurt him and the dems in the next election if they go stupid.

Maybe the senate will save him.

also, I would support a ban on installing the app on government devices given to government employees where government data would be accessed by them and their staff. However, that should be more of a defined security protocol that security experts demand rather than something implemented by congress and legislated.

Not seeing the issue here. I think Congress is playing a game of chicken to force TikTok to detach itself from its CCP-controlled parent company.

TikTok is one of the worst platforms for disseminating disinformation and CCP propaganda. It mines user's private info to a degree that would make Facebook, Instagram and X blush. (And all those platforms need a hard slap as well). If western democracies are to survive, they need to counter the absolute garbage that is populating social media. Look no further than the popularity of Donald J. Trump in the United States for how badly social media has warped minds.

Not saying that outright banning is the answer, but there needs to be a reckoning.

You're going to need to substantiate these claims, preferably without defining 'disinformation' as 'something I don't like'.

CNN:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/18/business/tiktok-search-engine-misinformation/index.html

The New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/04/technology/tiktok-deepfakes-disinformation.html

And here's a scholarly article:
https://www.captechu.edu/blog/tiktok-and-war-misinformation

And those were just the first three results from google.

Jesus Christ, Rick. Do some reading outside of your fantasyland bubble.

For once I agree with you.

It’s been all over the news and not just state controlled media.

Motte and bailey fallacy.

Those links support the claim that there exists misinformation on TikTok. Nobody including myself denies that.

Your claims were variously:
That disinformation - which is a different thing - is worse on TikTok than other social media platforms.
That TikTok is notable for disseminating CCP propaganda.
That data-mining by TikTok is worse than by other social media apps.

You have not supported those claims. So you'll need to do better.

Oh, this sounds much better.



https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/14/for...together-an-investor-group-to-buy-tiktok.html

Support this.

We all know why you're defending TikTok. It's littered with antisemitic and anti-Israel garbage, and a whole bunch of pro-Hamas propaganda. Why? Because destabilizing western democracies is the end-goal of the CCP and other hostile nation-states.

I accept your concession.

And here we have it. Speech on social media undermines legacy media and establishment control of the narrative, and so must be suppressed.

You're nuts.

Bring back Vine, IMO

Well it is.

TikTok is collecting way too much data that it can be strongarmed into giving to the Chinese government, if it hasn't already.

Other social media are collecting way too much data that they can be bribed or strongarmed into giving to the American government, or to any number of powerful corporations, if they haven't already. Perfectly innocent and not at all something that Congress should address as well.

Evidence?

From the river to the sea, the app store will be tiktok free!

The fact that the Trump-supporting conspiracy nutjob (Federal Farmer) and the ultra left-wing wackaloon (you) are in agreement on this issue is all the proof that's required.

(And yes, I'm not debating you on the merits because when there are, in fact, no merits it's not worth debating.)

The authoritarian has spoken. So if Trump wins, you’re cool with him having this power? Remember folks, it won’t always be your guy in charge, you never seem to learn this lesson when granting the president or congress more power and giving them the authority to ban more speech than they already have. Dumb, fantasy, tl;dr.

That you take the fact that people with differing political ideologies having a problem with this as being evidence enough that you should shut it down is not in fact the stunning refutation of the charge of authoritarianism that you think it is.

And while some might view this as a demonstration of the strength of the establishment, resort to such crude measures is actually a sign of weakness. They are no longer capable of managing public opinion (particularly that of young people) using the standard tools. In a related move, the UK government is recasting the definition of extremism to cover all sorts of dissident groups that they don't like, for the same reasons. But coersion is more likely to fail because it is so direct, can be more easily identified and fought.

I hope forcing the sale of TikTok is the beginning and not the end of discussions about better privacy protections for ALL these apps/social media companies.

Um, no. You and Federal Farmer are simply different sides of the same coin (i.e., the out of touch with reality coin).

Covid was just a test run to see what they could get away with and monkeys like @We Are Borg are complicit in the erosion of freedoms from the establishment.

Now you're arrogating to yourself the right to define reality, and insisting that those of us not in agreement ought to have the means we use to share our views suppressed. While calling me an extremist. Okay.

How does forcing the divestment of American TikTok suppress the means of sharing your views?

Where were you when Congress and Trump did this for Grindr in 2020?

Regardless of the merits of any argument about TikTok itself, this sort of move absolutely undermines the ability of the US to object when other countries block US based social networks.

The real comedy option will be if TikTok withdraws from the US officially and solutions are setup so many young people are still using it with workaround methods akin to the workarounds the US has historically sponsored to give those in countries with bans access to Twitter and the like.

Because 'divestment' (if that's what's happens, which is unclear) will mean an ownership which will be subservient to 'US national security' and do what it's told to modify its operations in ways that align with that.