• Hildegarde
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    1501 year ago

    Whatever Tiktok is doing, the correct response is to write enforcable laws to prevent ANY company from doing what Tiktok is doing.

    This is bad governance.

    • @Devccoon@lemmy.world
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      -221 year ago

      That’s what they did. The “correct response” is described in the article as the law 50/50 signed here.

      • Hildegarde
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        651 year ago

        Did you read the article? The bill bans tiktok for being foreign. There is nothing in this article that describes a bill that outlaws any practices, conventions, or actions that tiktok has done.

        Being afraid of foreigners for being foreign is not effective regulation.

        • @Trantarius@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          191 year ago

          The bill itself says, more or less, “any foreign adversary controlled app is banned. Also, TikTok is a foreign adversary controlled app”. So it doesn’t apply exclusively to TikTok, but it does explicitly include them.

          • Liz
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            81 year ago

            I think most of us here are concerned with foreign adversary interference as much as we are concerned with corporate interference and espionage. The law seems to only address the surface level issue (ownership) and none of the actual problems (action).

          • I Cast Fist
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            101 year ago

            Interesting wording there, “foreign adversary controlled”, goes a long way to protect all the companies that are based in tax havens, or controlled by foreign allies, like Saudi Arabia or Israel

            • @dumpsterlid@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              In a democracy one of the very most important choices that must be made by citizens is what other nations are considered allies or an enemies.

              The funny thing is that US citizens have absolutely zero control over who the government decides is our enemy or ally. That aspect of government is entirely partitioned off as separate from the “democracy”, as if the foreign policy element of our government was itself a foreign nation we have no control over.

              While we are on the topic, fuck the government of Saudi Arabia and Israel, both governments are horrendously violent.

          • @ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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            81 year ago

            The point is that companies like Google and Facebook do the same data harvesting and manipulation but aren’t being held to the same standard. The law is clearly written to benefit the US government not the citizens, while the justification is stated to be ‘for the benefit of the citizens.’ It’s like buying your wife a lawn tractor for her birthday even though you know she has no interest in using one. You’re claiming it’s for her but it’s really for you.

      • BreakDecks
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        01 year ago

        I’ve read this comment over 10 times now and I have no idea what the words “the law 50/50 signed here” means, so I can’t be sure I understand the argument you are trying to make. My best guess is that you are using circular logic to suggest that every democratically decided upon decision is always the right decision, which is nonsense because democracy is demonstrably fallible.

        • @Devccoon@lemmy.world
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          21 year ago

          My point might be a little Covid brain fogged but I’m just pointing out that they did exactly what the guy asked for, if they bothered to click past the title which makes it sound like a targeted “ban Tiktok” law.

          • Hildegarde
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            11 year ago

            I am not a guy. I read the entire article before commenting. The law did not do what I asked for. You would know if you read my comment all the way through.

            • @Devccoon@lemmy.world
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              11 year ago

              I think you’re making assumptions that I can read into what exactly you find wrong with Tiktok. That context is not there in the original comment.

              • Hildegarde
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                01 year ago

                Being chinese by definition can’t effect any company. There is enough context.

  • @dephyre@lemmy.world
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    2661 year ago

    Can the US Lawmakers do anything about the US companies harvesting my data and selling it off… please?

  • dohpaz42
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    2091 year ago

    So when do they plan to do something about those domestic businesses trying to manipulate citizens of America?

    • Neato
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      1191 year ago

      Capitalism abusing citizens? Just fine.

      “Communism” abusing citizens? Avengers, assemble!

      • 👍Maximum Derek👍
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        1 year ago

        They’re prospective communists. Supposedly they’re going to get there by 2050, but they just built a new massive luxury tower for their ultra wealthy so…

        • @bionicjoey@lemmy.ca
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          461 year ago

          It’s just like Marx said: “If you do an oppressive oligarchy for 100 years, it magically transforms into communism”

      • @Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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        221 year ago

        I think they’re more worried that it’s a foreign corporation going after their citizens and not a domestic corporation.

    • @boatswain@infosec.pub
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      591 year ago

      I mean, the domestic businesses are the ones who own Congress and are using it to get rid of a competitor.

      • @kalkulat@lemmy.world
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        251 year ago

        After the thousands of years of human history I’ve read about, getting rid of competitors seems to have been the primary concern of most of the ruling classes all over the world. Way back to Ur.

    • @krashmo@lemmy.world
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      11 year ago

      While you’re not wrong about double standards, anything that discourages the use of vapid social media platforms is a win in my book. Use whatever backwards logic you like to make it happen so long as it’s effective.

        • Aniki 🌱🌿
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          1 year ago

          Lemmy is a message board, not social media. Like fark or something awful. You have no idea who the duck i am. How is that social?

          • dohpaz42
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            21 year ago

            Bruh.

            forms of electronic communication (such as websites for social networking and microblogging) through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (such as videos)

          • @webadict@lemmy.world
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            61 year ago

            Users create and/or share content, check. Users discuss content, check.

            Unless you think something is missing from that definition, Lemmy is social media. It is pseudonymous, but it is still social because of the users.

            • Aniki 🌱🌿
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              Since when did that define social media? That’s the same thing as IRC. is IRC social media?

              ICQ had message boards where people would chat about the news. Was that social media?

              Again, fark is a place where people share content and discuss the news. Is that social media?

          • @SmilingSolaris@lemmy.world
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            31 year ago

            It is social media, just because your talking anonymously doesn’t mean you aren’t interacting socially. Jesus Christ your talking to people. Right now. Your being social media’d. Stop acting like your above it.

              • @Vespair@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                Undoubtedly, especially since I haven’t taken particular steps to obfuscate my identity here.

                But as I said in a comment below, I’m more worried about some unhinged nutbag online randomly targeting me than being a person of interest by any nefarious groups or organizations.

            • @spacecowboy@sh.itjust.works
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              11 year ago

              No it isn’t.

              When you download the app you let them have the following information/data about you:

              Purchases, location, contacts, search history, identifiers (!!), diagnostics, financial info, contact info, user content, browsing history, and usage data.

              Please tell us how any of that is “anonymous”.

              • @Vespair@lemm.ee
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                -21 year ago

                Cool dude, you’ve identified that big corporations data farm.

                Random bloke user with a vendetta still doesn’t know who I am, and that’s who I’m more worried about on the personal scale.

  • Nakedmole
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    521 year ago

    Tik Tok pushes so much toxic content towards children and teenagers it should be shut down in my opinion.

  • @agitatedpotato@lemmy.world
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    411 year ago

    Bold move. Who are they going to blame all the online privacy issues once they cant yell about the Chinese? Or are we going to start pretending everythings fine then?

    • @ItsMeSpez@lemmy.world
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      201 year ago

      Why do you think that they give a shit about online privacy? This isn’t a privacy bill, it’s a bill stopping another government from doing exactly the same shit that the US government does through domestic apps. They aren’t looking out for people, they’re afraid of the competition.

      • @Krauerking@lemy.lol
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        81 year ago

        This is exactly the take I find the most interesting.
        This is what the US has been doing everywhere for a decade+ now and suddenly it’s not ok? It’s because the grip is loosening and the sense of control and power is absolutely slipping and while it’s late to be grasping to get it back, it’s not unwarranted.

        I actually don’t think it’s a bad idea cause seriously creating an addiction that can only be served by other countries is not good for a healthy and good local populace. Is it a bit karma sure but I’d rather not live it as the same non addict if we can help it.

  • @Delta_V@lemmy.world
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    181 year ago

    An app would be allowed to stay in the US market after a divestiture if the president determines that the sale “would result in the relevant covered company no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary.”

    So apps can still be banned after divestiture, based on an arbitrary decision by one corrupt and potentially insane and/or senile person?

    After all the talk of a “rules based order”, I’m disappointed - this isn’t a rule, its a leap of faith into the arms of serial liars.

  • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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    201 year ago

    I don’t see why users would even have a problem with this. Same services, more competitive market, and with less ties to an evil dictatorship should be celebrated, right?

  • @JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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    241 year ago

    High school nerds pay attention. This is how you can make some money and have an excuse to talk to the hot girls…by installing a vpn on their phones so they can still have their tik tok.

    Get one popular girls phone set up and every girl in the school will be hitting you up within a week.

    • @LemmyKnowsBest@lemmy.world
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      161 year ago

      And why do you assume everyone including hot girls & popular girls aren’t already capable of installing their own VPNs? Unless of course you mean the high school nerd is going to pay for our VPN service, then come on over!

      • @JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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        I’m sure some do. I haven’t talked to many high school girls lately.

        If this goes through and this happened when I was in school…that’d be a once in a lifetime opportunity. I’d probably never even think of it then. I’d probably luck into it by telling the rest of the nerd table at lunch, jock overheard, sell him my services, and then word of mouth from there.

        That happening now…probably be the inspiration for the gen Z’s “American Pie”. Or “Superbad”.

        • @locuester@lemmy.zip
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          51 year ago

          Are you kidding? There isn’t a phone owning high schooler that doesn’t know how to vpn past their high school’s nanny software. You’re out of touch.

      • @escaped_cruzader@lemmy.world
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        -31 year ago

        aren’t already capable

        Anyone who can read and follow directions is capable

        Most people can’t install a VPN, including hot or cold girls

        • @JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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          81 year ago

          It’s more like most people are unwilling to find or read directions. Most people can do most things nowadays. They’re just unwilling to try.

        • ✺roguetrick✺
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          21 year ago

          This shit is like saying most people can’t connect to wifi. It’s not exactly rocket science.

    • @Euphoma@lemmy.ml
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      Highschooler here, everyone already uses vpn’s to bypass the school firewall to view blocked sites and stuff while on school wifi.

    • @fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee
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      21 year ago

      They won’t want TikTok once the chumps who follow them stop using it. They’ll have to do something other than dancing for strangers to bolster their self-esteem.

  • @affiliate@lemmy.world
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    651 year ago

    Many users called lawmakers’ offices to complain, congressional staffers told Politico. “It’s so so bad. Our phones have not stopped ringing. They’re teenagers and old people saying they spend their whole day on the app and we can’t take it away,” one House GOP staffer was quoted as saying.

    and they still voted 50-0. really tells you something about how much these politicians are willing to listen to their constituents.

    • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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      It was a 50-0 to pass the commission and then go to the House floor for a vote and then the Senate for a vote and finally signed into law by the president unless he vetoes it, which is possible imo.

      Honestly, teenagers and old people are the sorts of folks that need to be protected from themselves, I might just call in to my local representative to voice my support of forced sale, operating restrictions, or even outright ban.

      EDIT: I sent him an email.

        • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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          Love to, I think the 5 Bn USD FTC fine was a little light considering no jailtime was given. I hope their recent lawsuits lead to breaking the company up again.

      • @affiliate@lemmy.world
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        what are you even trying to say here? that it’s okay for politicians to ignore entire demographics? or that it’s only okay for them to ignore entire demographics if, ultimately, it’s left up to a different group of politicians to pass the law?

        i don’t use tiktok or have any interest in the app itself, but it’s still very alarming to see a vote go through 50-0 despite a “nonstop” flood of calls opposing it.

          • @affiliate@lemmy.world
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            191 year ago

            “protect them from themselves” is what you said. which carries the connotation that they don’t know what’s best for themselves and aren’t qualified to make judgments about those things. this is different from simply “protecting them”.

            • prole
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              191 year ago

              To be fair, a big part of a functioning society is a government with proper regulations in place so that people are not expected to be experts in literally every field before making a purchase or performing some kind of action. Obviously, calling it “protect[ing] them from themselves,” is dismissive and patronizing, but it’s pretty much why we need government in the first place.

              For example, the EPA recently issued a recall for ground cinnamon from certain specific (dollar store) brands due to unacceptably high levels of lead. Without the career scientists (and yes, bureaucrats) working for that regulatory agency, millions of people would have continued consuming the product and feeding it to their kids (low-income folks too in this case, given the brands) literally indefinitely.

              Without the EPA, every person who buys cinnamon is what, expected to use mass spectrometry to determine the exact molecular make-up of every spice (or in the case of the EPA, literally any food or prescription drugs you may ever consume) before using?

              If they didn’t do their cinnamon research, then they deserved it, and the government should have no involvement? What happens in cases where companies hide dangerous issues in their products to avoid losing profits?

              What if there’s literally no way for anyone but a scientist, with extensive lab access and at least 4+ years of university to know that there is an issue with a product (or a construction site, or a drug, or water treatment, etc)? They’re the only ones who should be able to properly avoid using a product that may kill them and their children? And even then, only when it’s a product they’re an expert in?

              Not saying you’re a libertarian, just like pointing out the obvious things that make it so so stupid.

              • @affiliate@lemmy.world
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                i agree with everything you’ve said here. and i liked the EPA example. sorry if what i said came across as libertarian, that was not my intention.

                i was just trying to push back against the “young people don’t know what’s best for themselves” mentality in the other post.

                although, to be clear, i think the current state of social media does have quite a few problems that need addressing, and more regulation on that would certainly be welcome.

              • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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                21 year ago

                Ok, sure. Show me what research you or they have done to justify “protecting them from themselves”. Already they’re telling lies by insinuating that only teenagers and old people are calling. And you all just believe it? Wild how biased people can be when presented with information they want to believe.

              • @treadful@lemmy.zip
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                11 year ago

                Would love to see the science or other expert opinions that is being used to justify this ban then.

                I haven’t heard anything except politicians making vague references to spying or other things we allow from domestic services.

                It’s just politics.

            • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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              -51 year ago

              What other reason could I possibly have? You think there is some massive anti-tiktok cabal out there trying to profit by… uh… fucking how?

              • @Gabu@lemmy.world
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                21 year ago

                By banning anything except the few 'murican tech giants doing the exact same shit as TikTok. Even a blind person can see how cancerous american companies are, yet this does nothing to address that.

                • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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                  01 year ago

                  Actually, they’re not doing that at all, they’re forcing a compromised unethical American to sell to a different unethical American to do exactly the same thing. At no point was a ban even discussed. So, literally everything you just said was wrong.

      • @Krauerking@lemy.lol
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        161 year ago

        Yeah honestly if a bunch of addicted teens and old people were calling me screaming that I can’t take away their drug of choice when that’s not even what’s happening, and it’s not being taken away just moved to where there can be more control on quality… Then I would be really considering the damage this is doing to them.

        I don’t know if supporting the junkies being taken advantage of is the altruistic take that these “absolute freedom” supporters think it is.

        • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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          71 year ago

          The fact that you guys just ate up that rhetoric without any hesitation… Like, you just happily believe it’s a bunch of “addicted old people and teenagers”? Is this reddit? Did I make a wrong turn at common sense and critical thinking?

          • @Krauerking@lemy.lol
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            01 year ago

            Uh dude… I know people addicted that got the email to message their representative. They will stop talking in a conversation and pull out their phone and just scroll through a few videos.

            I struggle to believe so many would be messaging just out of laziness but don’t question that being the age groups that would respond most to that kind of targeted messaging into action.

            • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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              11 year ago

              Nobody got an email. You don’t know shit.

              I never denied they sent a notification to people in the app. It offered to help get in touch with local reps. Why would people exercising their rights to communicate with politicians bother you in any way? That’s weird.

              Messaging out of laziness? What does that even mean? They were calling their local reps to voice their discontent.

              The people addicted comment just makes you look petty and ignorant. It might be time for you to graduate to Facebook.

      • BreakDecks
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        -51 year ago

        teenagers and old people are the sorts of folks that need to be protected from themselves

        Please, big daddy government, protect me from the freedom of choice. I cannot be trusted to consume without your permission.

        • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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          51 year ago

          “Mr. Legislator I am 84 and I need my Heroin but the federal government keeps cracking down on my supplier, please stop taking away all my Heroin Mr. Legislator. Also, force my bank to let me transfer 85,000 USD to India, it’s really important that I do that before the 27th.”

          • @Clent@lemmy.world
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            01 year ago

            Yes. This is called Nanny State.

            Rather than educate the populace, take away the tools. Of course, another tool will just rise to the surface but it will make a lot of people feel really good that they did something.

            I do appreciate all of the reactionary statements. I don’t use TikTok but I do believe in freedom. Reducing freedoms, no matter how well intentioned does not solve societies problems.

            • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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              You can’t educate dementia away. You can educate youth away, but that takes years, which would effectively be a ban for them. TikTok is not a tool for its users, it is a tool for a for profit corporation and by extension their associated foreign dictatorship.

              Absolute freedom should not extend to harming each other.

              • @ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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                41 year ago

                TikTok is not a tool for its users, it is a tool for a for profit corporation

                That pretty much describes every corporation in existence.

                • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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                  21 year ago

                  Some of them provide utility and some don’t, which is why we don’t allow children to drink, smoke, or gamble. If a company providing those goods and services targets those demographics it gets political action.

                  Welcome to the nuance of society and the modern world.

              • @Clent@lemmy.world
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                TikTok is one of hundreds of vectors to swindle the senile and I doubt it’s even in the top 10.

                Grandpa needs to have someone else handling his finances. It’s not the governments job and let’s not pretend this bill is about keeping grandpas money safe.

      • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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        It’s not just teenagers and old people. That’s just some bullshit rhetoric that you ate right up without question. Because of course you did. Millennials/middle age folk are abundant on TikTok as well as young adults.

        The audacity of some of you to jump into action just to spite “teenagers and old people” is shameful. So easily manipulated.

        • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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          Right, sorry, it’s fine to let teenagers and old people be harmed as long as the company can continue to profit off consenting adults as well. /sarcasm

          • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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            01 year ago

            How are they being harmed? Why was it so easy for them to make you believe this? Also, who asked you to protect anyone with your one petty little email lmao

            • @FiniteBanjo@lemmy.today
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              11 year ago

              A foreign dictatorship gathering face and voice id, entiry photo library and message history, contacts, and location tracking precise enough to pinpoint nearby devices and tell which floor of a building you’re on regardless of if the app is in use, to me equates to harm. If you disagree, well, I don’t give a fuck what you think tbh.

    • @realharo@lemm.ee
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      Are they “taking it away” though? Do normal people care about who owns it? Are they just worried about an unlikely ban?

      • @affiliate@lemmy.world
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        41 year ago

        you’re taking it as a given that bytedance will sell the app if this law passes. there is a chance that they won’t want to sell and then the app will be banned. (but i think this unlikely.)

        also, if i’m understanding things correctly, there’s the possibility that they do sell and the app still gets banned. the article says

        An app would be allowed to stay in the US market after a divestiture if the president determines that the sale “would result in the relevant covered company no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary.”

        depending on who the next president is, there’s no guarantee that they’ll say any sale will result in the company not being controlled by a foreign adversary. (although this past is just speculation.)

        anyways. this bill will certainly raise the chances that the app will be banned in the US. (and it opens the door for other apps to get banned if the US doesn’t like the country they were developed in.)

        • @realharo@lemm.ee
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          I also just noticed in the article:

          TikTok urged its users to protest the bill, sending a notification that said, “Congress is planning a total ban of TikTok… Let Congress know what TikTok means to you and tell them to vote NO.”

          Also from a BBC article about the same thing:

          Earlier, users of the app had received a notification urging them to act to “stop a TikTok shutdown.”

          So they were literally sending out misleading notifications (because a forced sale is not a total ban), and then the users wrote to Congress based on that…

          The probability that they will sell seems really high to me, as the same thing almost happened back in 2020.

            • shastaxc
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              21 year ago

              Yeah but if they sell then it’s someone else stuck holding the bags so why wouldn’t they?

              • @Delta_V@lemmy.world
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                21 year ago

                because its not in the corporation’s interest to incur the expense and organizational disruption if they’re still going to get banned anyway - profit is maximized by continuing with business as usual instead of spending resources attempting to reach compliance

          • @Misconduct@startrek.website
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            They also claimed that it was only “old people and teenagers” who were calling in and objecting which wasn’t true. One rep stood up and straight up lied claiming that TikTok users were “forced” to call. How would that even work? TikTok possibly being banned isn’t a lie but all that other shit sure was. It was just a popup offering to help locate local reps to call and make their voices heard. The fact that any of you are pretending that people taking this democratic action is a bad thing is appalling and your bias is blatantly obvious. The absolute ego on all of you to act like you just know better than all of those other people because… Reasons? Ridiculous.

            • @realharo@lemm.ee
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              Do you have the full text of the notification that you could post here? Kinda hard discussing the specifics otherwise.

              If it really contains the quote “Congress is planning a total ban of TikTok”, I do consider that misleading.

              People here are often making a lot of noise about disinformation campaigns on sites like Facebook and Twitter and YouTube (and that’s just from user-posted content that the sites fail to moderate, not posted by the sites themselves), so I don’t see why this would get a pass.

    • @Atyno@dmv.social
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      1 year ago

      From what I read, the calls actually evaporated opposition to the bill.

      Which, I’m NGL, if you’re worried about an app being used by a foreign adversary to encourage anti-social behavior in your youth, a bunch of people calling in acting like drug addicts getting their drugs taken away is only going to erase doubts.

      It doesn’t help that they’d even be more justified when it’s known that it was caused by users getting pushed notified by Tik Tok to do it.

      • BreakDecks
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        11 year ago

        Encouraging people to contact their representatives and demand action? Congress clearly can’t have this. How will they do their jobs if they are constantly forced to engage with their constituents?

        • @Atyno@dmv.social
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          21 year ago

          In my opinion, considering Tiktok’s algo they had the best circumstance to notify a mix of their users more aligned with the actual electorate. The fact they ended up with the worst representation of their user base when it came to confirming the suspicions of politicians says everything.

        • @nialv7@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Call to action from, say, activist groups is very different from call to action from a billion-dollar company. This does make me really worried about how much influencer TikTok has on people ngl

    • @ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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      51 year ago

      It also tells you something about all the supposed gridlock in Washington that can magically evaporate when there’s money and power to be gained from it.

  • @yarr@feddit.nl
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    101 year ago

    I want my data to be centralized, profiled and used against me, but I want it by American corporations, dammit!

  • @jaschen@lemm.ee
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    461 year ago

    Good. Fuck them and all social media controlled by any big mega corp. But fuck the CCP especially.

    • @TheFriar@lemm.ee
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      211 year ago

      The fucked up thing is they don’t seem to have a problem with rich 1%ers owning and manipulating millions of people. Only when it’s the Chinese. Facebook, Twitter, instagram are just as harmful. Although the delivery method of the content isn’t exactly “tailored” on those services like TikTok. I dunno how I feel about this. I mean, I think all social media services should die out. This just seems like an uneven hand.

        • @TheFriar@lemm.ee
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          31 year ago

          This is a really great way of putting it. I’d never heard that before, but it’s a truly apt way of summarizing one of the biggest problems I have with fellow leftists. However, I think I’d argue this is a slightly different situation.

          Yeah, it’s a start toward something good. But it’s still sticky in its spirit.

          It’s sort of similar to the complaint against incrementalism. It’s true, incrementalism is not a healthy solution to the problems we face. But fighting against good steps forward because you’re against the concept of incrementalism is…foolish…right? Or is it? Because sinking our efforts into incrementalism takes away effort from broad advancement. And incrementalism has been our MO since forever. And it’s only brought us further down the road to ruin.

          But, again, fighting good incremental changes is nonsense. I dunno, it’s a nuanced issue and I’m not even sure how I feel about it. It’s interesting. And as someone who doesn’t use the more “standard” social media and never has, I’m all for erasing social media from existence. I’ve seen what it did to everyone in my life, and I was the perfect age for every step of social media’s growth: xanga/livejournal in middle school, MySpace in middle school/early high school, and then Facebook came about in my senior year, instagram in college and while i traveled in my early 20s…but I was an anti-anything-popular emo kid and goddamn I’m glad I was. But I also saw first hand how much social media changed my interactions with everyone in my life. It wasn’t pretty. People were addicted, constantly being just floored that I wasn’t on FB, countless people threatening to make me a Facebook page? It was severely strange behavior. And now tiktok is like all of that on goddamn super steroids. But it’s less people shoving it down my throat, and more just completely sucked in by it. Which is honestly scarier.

  • @S_204@lemm.ee
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    151 year ago

    Tik tok is at the root of so many of the social issues we’re facing today. It’s absolutely worse than Facebook, although both need to be addressed.

      • Encrypt-Keeper
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        231 year ago

        It has a huge hold over our youth today, even folks up to 30. It’s so ubiquitous it’s used as a replacement for Google to find new information including political.

        Problem is it’s absolutely chock full of misinformation and propaganda, which doesn’t just exist on the platform, but is actively pushed on American youth today.

        • @Randomgal@lemmy.ca
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          21 year ago

          It’s full of misinformation and propaganda unlike… You know… All those super reliable objective sources of information that you use?

          • Encrypt-Keeper
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            61 year ago

            Oh yes VERY unlike those. Anything that can be traced and verified, aren’t read to you by an AI voice or a white person claiming to be an American while trying very hard to suppress an Eastern European or East Asian accent. Another good trait to have would be anything that isn’t verifiably false.

              • Encrypt-Keeper
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                1 year ago

                It sure does, but it doesn’t only show you what you interact with the most. It shows you lots of other stuff too. The exact algorithm of which neither you or I are privy to so don’t get too cocky thinking you have it all figured out. After all “interacting with” can be something as small as lingering on a video just a bit too long. One second longer than your usual average view time. That’s all it takes for an algorithm to decide it’s worth it to push more content like it at you. And given that it’s a priority goal for propaganda, bots, and misinformation posters to craft their video in a way to maximize your engagement, that’s a trivial thing to accomplish.

                Algorithms are by design, a way to remove your agency in finding information for yourself, and instead give the platform control over the information you see. This is very handy and even innocent when you just want to see memes that you personally think are funny, but very dangerous when it’s used to mislead you or influence your behavior and thinking. And most people aren’t smart or tech savvy enough to know how any of this works, which makes them very easy to manipulate.

              • @S_204@lemm.ee
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                31 year ago

                Thanks for proving why that platform is just so damned dangerous. The ignorance it inspires is shocking.

              • @Krauerking@lemy.lol
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                51 year ago

                Well that and whatever will keep you addicted and hopefully spending money. Rage, bias confirmation, propaganda that hits the class or group you belong to. And the more you trust it the more they can use that trust.

              • @nomous@lemmy.world
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                61 year ago

                Among other things.

                If it only showed you what you interacted with the most it’d be less of an issue but that’s not how it works. Thats not even how it works on YouTube.

    • @Same@lemmy.world
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      01 year ago

      Sorry but this is giving ‘old man yells at clouds’ energy. How is tiktok any worse than any other social media platform? They’re all echochambers filled with misinformation, it just what happens when you get a lot of people online.

      • @S_204@lemm.ee
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        01 year ago

        That you’re trying to ‘they’re all the same’ bs shows how ignorant many people are on this. They’re not all the same, this one is especially bad and it’s not JUST because it turns you into a fucking retard when you use it.

  • AutoTL;DRB
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    131 year ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    The House Commerce Committee today voted 50-0 to approve a bill that would force TikTok owner ByteDance to sell the company or lose access to the US market.

    If the bill passes in the House and Senate and is signed into law by President Biden, TikTok would eventually be dropped from app stores in the US if its owner doesn’t sell.

    These applications present a clear national security threat to the United States and necessitate the decisive action we will take today," she said before the vote.

    Gallagher also said his bill puts the decision “squarely in the hands of TikTok to sever their relationship with the Chinese Communist Party.”

    While the bill text could potentially wrap in other apps in the future, it specifically lists the ByteDance-owned TikTok as a “foreign adversary controlled application.”

    An app would be allowed to stay in the US market after a divestiture if the president determines that the sale “would result in the relevant covered company no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary.”


    The original article contains 601 words, the summary contains 171 words. Saved 72%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!