Comment by unityByFreedom | Hacker News Reader

Comment by unityByFreedom | Hacker News Reader

> the lawmakers asked the acting director of national intelligence Joseph Maguire if the app maker could be compelled to turn Americans’ data over to the Chinese authorities.

> Both Schumer and Cotton warn that TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, is “still required to adhere” to Chinese law.

I'm surprised if there are many TikTok users in the US.

What is the draw of that app? The description on Wikipedia says is it is for "markets outside China" but all the content I see upvoted on reddit appears to be from China. Do they just take the popular videos from China's version (that the West has never seen) and inject them into TikTok, making TikTok appear to be popular/high quality?

>>I'm surprised if there are many TikTok users in the US.

Tiktok is

#1 in social category in US on Google Play.

#1 in Entertainment in US on Apple App Store.

Does that surprise you?

I'm not surprised, and I don't think many people look to those rankings as good proxies for innovative software.

They just show what's popular, not what's hip. Being part of the borg is not enviable.

There was just an article about how U.S. high school students are forming TikTok clubs:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/19/style/high-school-tiktok-...

Good for them. If I were a parent, I might ask my kid why a Chinese-made app does not allow content made in China to be viewed in the US (and allow communication with its original author), or vice versa.

I realize not every parent will attempt to have this conversation with their kids, and that's fine. For me, it's about discovering history and determining what we value.

If you haven’t noticed (because you don’t use it or whatever), they are burning money aggressively advertising on Snapchat. Add to that the fact that it filled the void left by Vine.

The stridency with which you make factually incorrect claims that can be invalidated with a single Google Search is some witches' brew of impressive and disturbing.

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