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Comment by factorialboy | Hacker News Reader

What if China stalls and the US administration changes in a few months.

Pivot to the pacific was an Obama initiative that was loooong in the making.

It doesn’t matter who drives the train, the tracks are already laid.

Yup, it was Trump that tantrumed out of the TPP, which was created as a firewall to China. Because of this, China has been growing increasingly confident, sensing the weakness in this administration and its inability to play geopolitics properly.

It matters hugely.

Obama's pivot was based on TTP, and generally avoiding direct confrontation with China.

Trump's agenda is completely different - ignoring partnership/bilateral approach, and fairly assertively acting against China.

But those were also strategies founded in different eras: the TTP was create back when China was still not quite powerful enough to be a dangerous world actor. Now it's more of a 'standoff' situation with unpredictable leadership from Trump.

And with only a 4 year horizon after which 'everything changes' on the American side.

The TTP is in fact direct confrontation, just not overt.

I think you meant to say ByteDance, the private company that owns and controls TikTok.

Conflating the CCP owning and controlling a private company's platform is the propaganda that seems to be spun out this situation.

It's also what is causing people to see the app as a threat, ergo, highlighting exceptionalism and a tiny bit of xenophobia.

China doesn't control Android and iOS App stores in US.

Don’t think it’ll change with Biden. The rhetoric level may change, but the overall sentiment is quite bipartisan and public opinion of China right now in America is awful.

Also, the US can just ban it tomorrow and it’ll disappear.

then tiktok may simply provide a web version. Will US build some kind of firewall?

They already have a web app

They will not have remotely the same size of users who will be using the web version. The concern is size of their the control , not that they control at all

They'll probably end up banning advertisers from paying them, and TikTok from paying content creators. Sure, Americans will still be able to access the content (over an inferior interface), but TikTok will probably be losing money on American viewers (not necessarily a problem for a propaganda outlet), and TikTok won't be able to incentivize good content.

in what sense is TikTok a "propaganda outlet"?

In the sense that they have been known to remove discussion that the CCP doesn't like [1], that they've created an environment where people feel the need to talk positively about China to get views [2], and in the sense that they are controlled by a company with close ties to the CCP (like practically every large company in China, harder to cite this but for an example see [3]).

[1] https://www.engadget.com/2019-09-25-tiktok-censorship-china....

[2] https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiktok-users-gush-about-china-h...

[3] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bytedance-filing/bytedanc...

You've hit my concern. Which was very little about spyware, and more about having a platform installed on devices all over the world that the CCP can just slip content into whenever it wants. Russia signed up for FB/Twitter/Reddit accounts and spread confusion and lies, imagine if they owned the platforms how much more targeted and impactful it could be.

TikTok seems to impress people with its algorithm serving them content they like, many HNers describe it as addicting even, that sounds like a tool for manipulation (which feels like all the internet is these days anyway, but I digress.)

I also don't like the idea of the US banning apps. But I also don't trust people to choose not to invest attention in TikTok. The world's a muddy, messed up, place.

> then tiktok may simply provide a web version. Will US build some kind of firewall?

There is no need to do that. TikTok has significant US offices and operations. All the government would have to do is fine them/arrest them if they refuse to follow the law.

Thats how the law works. If you don't follow it, you get fined or arrested.

So what is the source of Beijing Biden?

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