Good.
Governments banning social media based on who can use it to spy on who, instead of creating privacy regulations and enforcing them to create and regulate markets, which is kinda what they should do, to make it so it doesn’t matter who owns which app. Taking an opportunity and shitting all over it for some childish standoff should be beneath us.
It wont work either, there’s so many legal tricks that can change the owner of a company without actually changing who controls the company.
“TikTok was evil and controlled by China, so we banned it. Oh look, here’s a totally new website called TokTik owned by a US Citizen named Mr. ILoveChina who built a TikTok replacement in 15 minutes by hiring foreign consultants for 2 cents an hour.”
I think the tiktok fiasco is just another wrong solution to a problem. The problem is data collection and mismanagement of it; and no one is getting ‘royalties’ for their data being sold or used.
Facts. We need better data protection laws, especially now more than ever with the rise of AI
Users are freaking out
Oh noo how will I manage without my daily cringe worthy bullshit videos mixed with ads
I actually get pretty good info from TT. Lawyer insight on Trump trials, video quotes from politicians, summaries of new laws, science summaries for dummies that don’t have physics degrees, etc.
I loathe tiktok but if someone had banned Reddit while I was still using it I would have been hella mad. On the other hand it would have been “How will I manage without unhinged shitposts mixed with ads” from the outside
You are right, they should ban lemmy too since it’s used for propaganda by anticapitalists! /s
If they banned lemmy and reddit you would be freaking out too. The difference is many people run their businesses on tik tok. Your making fun of people who are losing their livelihood.
Nah. Lemmy is a software. Reddit is an entity. They could try to ban specific Lemmy servers. They’ve tried to go after torrent tracker sites with little to no success. This wouldn’t be any different.
I think it’s illuminating and hilarious that they’re actually going through with this though. I’ve long made the statement that capitalists and Leninist are kissing cousins on all the worst possible fronts. And here’s another data point.
Lol wut? I don’t think you know what “leninist” means.
There’s what they claim to be and what they are. What they claim to be, is a transitional centralized system of government aimed at jump starting communism. What they are is that without a mechanism or plan to transition. Ending up in EVERY SINGLE GROUP that has tried devolving into an authoritarian suppressive system. Benefitting largely those at the top.
The Party heads in Moscow benefited far more than the average citizen of the Soviet Union. Nearly every modern Russian oligarch has a direct line that can be drawn back to former party leadership. Xi Jinping does not live in government block housing like a regular citizen. Nor do any of the families of top party members. And should a Chinese citizen complain. They will be brutally ostracized and excluded from society at best. Jailed for life or slaughtered if they’re not so lucky. Capitalists salivate about being able to do that with impunity. They still do it. Just not with impunity yet.
I would love it if the government banned Reddit.
Lemmy I could live without. If any users are making their livelihoods on Lemmy or Reddit, they should find something more productive to do.
More productive? Dog they are small businesses that are using tik tok as a store front. Like how people run business through Facebook. What your saying is “fuck these people they should just go work a soul crushing job at a big corporation like me”
Didn’t know scamming people was such a nice business.
There are non-scam companies on TikTok. I don’t use it but it’s easy enough to see. People use it to hustle their marketing and advertising, some people even hire to fill that role.
First example that comes to mind is from years ago, but a dude started and grew a business in Miami for selling exotic fruits that are unique to Florida to anyone online. Something like $100 for a seasonal, shipped overnight, cooler of exotic fruits with info/instructions. He got a girlfriend and she made their popularity explode using TikTok. The best way I can describe her videos is making it seem like you’re bougie if you subscribe to their seasonal boxes monthly.
Whatever she did worked though. Not a scam, you pay and get the fruit.
So people selling on Ebay is a scam? People selling on Etsy is a scam?
I would love it if the government banned Reddit.
Lemmy I could live without. If any users are making their livelihoods on Lemmy or Reddit, they should find something more productive to do.
by Stovetop@lemmy.world
I nominate this for the least aware comment on lemmy. We truly have a gem here. “If someone is making their living in a way I don’t understand, they should get a real job. After all, it doesn’t affect me, so it must be fine.”
Truly well-spoken, just look at all of the many high-paying jobs available to people of all skill levels, I mean, it’s not enough that an entire generation needs to hustle and convert every waking moment into opportunities to generate capital in order to barely survive… but also please do it in a way that Stovetop understands and supports. Otherwise, it’s not “productive”, whatever high-minded values that meaningless phrase is supposed to represent. Clueless.
Null empathy, null emotional intelligence, null consideration. Truly a masterpiece.
Stovetop please stay the way you are, we want to study you.
What sort of living do you think users are eking out on Reddit or Lemmy?
Social media commerce is all scams and influencers. There are much more productive things people could do to contribute to the betterment of society without trying to capitalize the brain space of gullible and vulnerable people.
That is a good question.
The world of late stage capitalism. When “scammer” starts to become a common profession… perhaps instead of asking why everyone is becoming a scammer, ask what type of system rewards and necessistates it, and why?
There are hints in this discussion to what is wrong with the world we inhabit that leads people down this path, and that is the picture I want to draw for you.
In short, people are extremely desperate. Some might think this is just how things are, but I happen to be one of the people who thinks it is by design. The richest want to keep the workers hungry, afraid, lacking security, and the house (in which they have financial stake in) can rake in the gains. The intentional applied divisiveness of capitalism.
In that context, I wanted to point out the privileged life that you likely live in order to not realize the desperation that drives someone to capitalize on every financial opportunity available, even the crazy ones. My statement isn’t in favor of making revenue on X, Y, or Z platform, my statement is in critique over your critique of how others earn a living, as well as your disregard for their situation. I was urging you to walk a mental mile in someone else’s shoes.
Also I apologize for mocking you, it’s not personal but I couldn’t resist taking the piss out of your comment.
Well, I’m freaking out a bit despite hating TikTok and believing it’s harmful to the average user. I don’t believe in censorship, and I think banning an app like this is a form of censorship.
That said, even if Lemmy and Reddit were banned, I would probably react similarly. I don’t need Reddit or Lemmy and can do without, but I disagree very much with the censorship.
How do you run a business on TikTok?
You use it to advertise and show off your items without having a actual shop. Tik Tok also has a shop you can buy from and you can list your items on there.
The closest thing I can think of that’s similar to it would be Etsy but instead of having just pics of your products you can have short videos of it.
I think it’s ironic this is posted here on Lemmy, which is what it is today mainly thanks to users of another service freaking out over how they will manage without their API access to bullshit aggregated content mixed with astroturfing.
Lol I feel so called out
Reddit and TikTok are incredibly different. And most of us that came over here from Reddit were there and we all saw the quality of Reddit going downhill for a long time. And when Reddit decided to try to be more like a TikTok style company, we all bailed.
So it’s not that ironic. We all willingly left when a company made one more decision screwing us over. These people are clawing at their phones to stay on an app.
us be like please please stop spying on our children so that WE can do that and also prevent the thoughtcrime of believing genocide (in Palestine) is bad
Why do people keep bringing up Palestine when talking about TikTok? Is this some CCP astroturfing?
But you do realise there’s a difference between a business owning some data about its users in a well regulated democracy and the Chinese state having free access to a tonne of personal data about a vast amount of people in the West?
Also, I presume you are aware that China prohibits the export of data on Chinese citizens to western servers.
While it’s not exactly important who started it, China started it.
There are a million startups chomping at the bit to create or have their existing app become the TikTok replacement in the event it does get banned.
This is the nature of American Capitalism. A monopolistic entity is broken up for this reason or that thereby making way for competition. According to all those economists, competition is good and breeds innovation.
I don’t have a problem with this. Next go for Google, Meta, Apple, and Microsoft too.
This isn’t an anti-trust case, it’s just anti-China posturing and lobbying from Meta and friends bearing fruit. Google and Meta will fight for the users and their monopolies will grow even more menacingly bloated
Well, before you declare anti-China posturing, have you considered how China treats Western social media companies? They are completely banned.
China takes a protectionist stance towards many industries, whereas the US claims, not entirely correctly, to be a bastion of free trade. I’m not sure US citizens want their government taking cues from the CCP either
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
I mean in trade disputes it often does.
Perhaps, but not when you’re supposed to be the bastion of free speech. And while there is the aspect of this being about domestic neerdowells not getting their beaks wet. There’s plenty speech suppression involved as well. I think the stunt ticktok pulled in this case backfired spectacularly. It had been lurking in the background for a while. But it seems they felt urgency after that.
I’d still have a problem with this even if they shut down sites like stormfront as well. But at least that would be consistently wrong. Not hypocritically wrong.
Yep, imperialism is the same system of violent control regardless of its nationalist branding.
Removed by mod
Champing at the bit (not “chomping”)
You can’t tell me what to dooo!
I mean in all honesty if another app takes over TikTok it’ll just be Instagram reels. It’s already got a lot of cross-buy-in.
they already said they will ceasoboperations in the us if they can’t fight this off in court
TikTok had $18b in revenue last year.
They’re not going to cease operating. They’re going to spend $17b on lawyers.
Now that it’s happening, I don’t quite know how to feel.
I certainly don’t feel sorry for Tiktok though.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
TikTok CEO Shou Chew has issued a rallying cry to users that the company plans to fight a possible US ban.
A foreign-aid bill passed Tuesday by the US Senate and signed by President Joe Biden Wednesday has millions of Americans who use TikTok freaking out over a potential ban.
The clip has over four million views as of Wednesday afternoon, and the comments show that users aren’t ready to say goodbye to TikTok anytime soon.
Many expressed support for Chew, whose call to action hints at the pressure building against TikTok and its Chinese owners, Bytedance.
Others credited the platform for helping users find “their voice and livelihood” and providing “a sense of community here that we don’t have anywhere else.”
Despite Chew’s defiant video and the growing outrage from the app’s users, a TikTok ban won’t happen in the immediate future.
The original article contains 261 words, the summary contains 143 words. Saved 45%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
YouTube is going to eat their audience with Shorts.
It won’t be YouTube Shorts, which isn’t doesn’t even have a functioning algorithm.
If they had the best of the users in mind they would try to sell it. But if I was the CCP I would do everything so they couldn’t sell it. Then you’d have a martyr which you could always point to that the US is also blocking, so blocking can’t be so bad.
I don’t see what the CCP would get out of selling it.
It’s kind of revealing really, the CCP clearly doesn’t want this app operating in the US simply to make money otherwise they’d simply sell and move on.
Hopefully users will be able to put 2+2 together themselves once the withdrawal starts to fade.
being compelled to sell by the government is generally not a great way to make money
Good way for whoever buys it to get a hell of a discount though…
my master plan, of laughing at people when the government overstepping is complete is FINALLY coming to fruition.
/s for those who haven’t already discovered it.
They’re banning it because they blame tick tok for the pro Palestinian movement. Zuck and Google have been spying on users for decades.
As bad as Meta and Google are in this respect, they are not under direct government control. It’s just different with the TikTok parent.
Zuck and Google have been spying on users for decades.
Also not Chinese companies.
Hmm brand new account, first comment, definitely no Astroturfing going on here.
y’all are PARANOID. anyone who disagrees is a shill
Baby’s 1st comment 🥹
I’m not for banning shit. I am for educating. We need to show people what TikTok really is, what it does and how it affects shit.
You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink. Many lack the complexity of thought to understand they are being played like fiddles.
Ah fuck it, its just the next step the US is just mad China got this privacy invader and not them. Meanwhile Meta is the internet to most of Africa.
All major social medias have been toxic and invasive and only now does it matter to the US.
It’s not about privacy. China and the US have all the data on you they could want. It’s about control. TikTok has successfully activated their base to contact their representatives with a notification from the app. It shows that they could use it to influence our politics.
China recognizes the danger, hence all western apps being banned. If they recognize the danger, then they must also recognize the utility. Are they using it? It’s hard to say, but TikTok is what that would look like.
You mean like how rideshare apps told their users to vote in specific ways on specific ballot proposals? No talk about banning those apps.
Sure, but as far as I’m aware they’re American companies. Americans are allowed to influence our elections. Foreign agents are not. Whether they’re doing it on behalf of China or not, they’re foreign agents with a lot of political power, and have been shown to use it for their own self interest.
Billionaires might as well be considered foreign agents. They’re parasites who are doing a lot more damage to the country than any actual foreign agent has ever managed.
The problem, from the government’s perspective, is that there’s no way to only see some of the fnords. If we teach people to recognize Chinese propaganda, they’ll start to recognize American propaganda too. Better to keep us stupid and then control who’s allowed to talk to us in the first place.
People dont care so long as their friends are also using it.
Can someone make a federated decentralised alternative for these fellow addicts? At least they won’t be at mercy of geopolitical powers but only our local, innocent, slightly mad admins.
I realise though that it would take gargantuan effort$
A federated alternative for that already exists - peertube. Adapting it to a short form video format wouldn’t be that difficult. However, running it (any video streaming platform) is expensive. How do u plan to fund it?
I plan to kindap a one of forbes top 100. Then hold them captive until the desired result is achieved and legal matters resolved
I’ve heard of Goldfish and Vidzy.
