As someone in the US who has had their private data leaked multiple times (ive lost count) and is extremely careful when browsing you tube as to not be drawn into a conspiracy ridden rabbit hole, I’m not sure what the point of this tik tok ban is. To me tik tok is social media business as usual. If congress is going to go this hard on a social media company and privacy concerns they should be doing this with all the other companies that pry into our private lives and try their best to manipulate us as well (car makers, appliance manufactures, phone makers, wearbales, ect…) otherwise to me this comes across as the US congress extorting a single company to make billionaires richer. It has been shown time and time again that even US based social media companies are vulnerable to influencing conspiracy theorists and swaying the votes of thousands of people.I feel like we are at the pinnacle of technological ignorance here. Thoughts?
My issue is that this is the kind of law I’d traditionally associate with China, and. I do think we should be harder on foreign influence but I think it erodes our freedom to do it like this. Especially given that nothing is being done about AIPAC or white nationalist Russian asset Elon Musk.
I also worry a conservative will buy it and boost manosphere, white nationalist, etc. content more. And as it is TikTok boosts these people, intentionally or not.
I know it’s not completely unprecedented, something similar happened to Grindr, but this is a higher profile case.