Summary

TikTok faces a U.S. shutdown by Jan. 19 unless the Supreme Court delays or blocks a law requiring its Chinese parent, ByteDance, to divest.

The Biden administration defends the law as a national security measure, citing potential risks of Chinese government influence. Content creators argue it violates free speech.

Donald Trump, once a supporter of the ban, seeks a delay to reach a “political resolution.”

A shutdown could cost TikTok millions of users and revenue. The court’s decision, due soon, could reshape U.S. digital speech policy.

    • emeralddawn45@discuss.tchncs.de
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      5 days ago

      What is facebook? Instagram? Google? Twitter? I dont use any of those if i can help it, nor TikTok. But supporting the ban of one of them while allowing the others free reign just because they’re owned in the US is insane. Their CEOs don’t have anyone’s best interests in mind except their own, as has been proven time and time again.

    • holo@lemmy.wtf
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      5 days ago

      A cancer that has allowed tens to hundreds of thousands of people to make money without being employed by anyone else, while providing entertainment for people that can’t or don’t need to pay.

      Everyone spies on everything all the time. Either write a privacy law or stop complaining some rich white people arent making enough money – because that is all this ban is.

  • gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de
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    5 days ago

    replace “data” with “ads/propaganda/right-wing content”.

    Sorry about the bad quality, i’ve resent this picture so many times now that there’s barely any pixels left.

      • Sarmyth@lemmy.world
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        5 days ago

        Why do people.keep saying this? It’s obviously not fine.

        These guys get dragged in front of Congress all the time. The US has the right to take measures against a business they feel they can’t control, doing things they consider detrimental to it’s people. Ideally that would occur in a more balanced method than now, and it would be nice if Nazi’s weren’t also American citizens with 1st amendment rights, but here we are.

        There are many Chinese based companies that do business on American soil with no issues. This isn’t even really Chinese based, but has a major Chinese stakeholder. For some reason, this company, over many others, was believed to be a threat. It may not be the weird racism you’re being led to believe. What if it actually is a very credible threat from an outside actor? Is there a world where that’s possible and acceptable to you?

        Just curious because I feel like there’s some strange zeoltry for TikTok that I haven’t seen so much with other media corporations lately, that aren’t actively pumping out propaganda. FOX News being the obvious example.

        • doomcanoe@sh.itjust.works
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          5 days ago

          No one thinks it’s a case of “weird racism”, but it does seem politically and/or financially motivated. If it was a legitimate threat, they could have informed the public as to the actual threat. The fact that they didn’t reveal it implies doing so would undermine the decision.

          Beyond that, most folks are not mad TikTok is getting banned, they (myself included) are mad that obvious and legitimate threats to the public relating to social media and data harvesting are being ignored. And to avoid having that conversation, TikTok is getting a blanket ban.

          What if it actually is a very credible threat from an outside actor? Is there a world where that’s possible and acceptable to you?

          So to answer this question, yes, that is possible and acceptable in two (not mutually exclusive) worlds. One where the actual threat is revealed so it is obvious why it needs to be addressed. Or two, where the government is also acting in good faith to protect Americans from the other more obvious threats of social media.

          Without one or both of those worlds, it is extremely difficult to assume this was a decision made in good faith. Afterall, they didn’t create rules to prevent TikTok from harvesting data, nor create rules that propaganda needs to be monitored and labeled. They didn’t draft up a Digital Bill of Rights to protect Americans, and then ban TikTok for violating it. They just dropped the ban hammer with a “trust me bro”.

          And given that, it also shows how far the government is willing to go to avoid holding American companies accountable. Which, imho, is the crux of why so many folks are peeved with this ban.

  • Supervisor194@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    Why is everything so glacially slow anymore. Fucking do something! I’ve been hearing about the demise of TiKTok for like three YEARS. Die already. Or don’t, I’m just sick of hearing about how it “might close” any fucking day now.

  • bdonvr@thelemmy.club
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    6 days ago

    People really cheering this? I don’t like TikTok because I don’t much care for that style of short form video - but let’s not act like it would be better under US tech giant control. Worse, I’d say.

    Officials say Chinese authorities can compel ByteDance to hand over information on TikTok’s U.S. patrons

    Oooooh scaaaaary. I’d feel much safer having it under the control of a government who actually affects my life. 🙄

    Red scare 2.0 bullshit

    • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml
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      5 days ago

      I am conditioned to be revolted by autoplay videos. Even here, when I opened this post on the mobile web version, a video autoplayed at the top and I immediately stopped it.

      • MetalMachine@feddit.nl
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        5 days ago

        You’re absolutely right. But the palestine issue pushed it over the edge. I forgot who exactly from the israeli camp but they said “we lost a whole generation”

  • HeyJoe@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    Is there anything stopping them from just renaming the company and rebranding it to avoid this? I could care less if it goes away or not, but I am curious how easily it could be to just rename yourself or if that’s actually covered somehow in this. Even still, I feel like there will definitely be loopholes that they can do to skate around it?

    • EldritchFeminity@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      6 days ago

      All they need to do is literally sell the American branch to a US company - even one they set up themselves.

      The reason that they won’t do this is because a US founded company has to play by different rules than a Chinese company can.

  • frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io
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    6 days ago

    Great, I can smell the undeserved court injunction getting ready to spew forth from the Supreme Court. The type no regular US citizen would ever get for actual violations of the 1st amendment.