- algo is a black box, and uncalibrated youtube makes my eyes bleed;
- own by the biggest spy on the planet, google, known for manipulating information, monopolistic behavior, participation in the worst gov programs (e.g: PRISM);
- impose American censorship rules to the entire world, and makes creators do inane cuts to fit some terrible metrics
Besides, the typical Tik Tok customer doesn't give a damn about those things. They didn't on facebook, insta, whatsapp, or whatever. They don't even know it's an issue, "have nothing to hide", don't care about privacy, power centralization, citizen spying and so on.
So Tik Tok or something else doesn't matter.
But we do. :)
And, objectively speaking, the US government is far preferable to the CCP. The US has it's issues and has made mistakes in the past, the CCP is still putting Muslims in concentration camps and exercises regular authoritarian controll over it's citizens. Militarily, the US is allied with most EU powers (including France) and generally has good intentions for it's allies. China, on the other hand, finds itself on the outside of most alliances, and considering that even their own people are treated poorly, I can only imagine that their intentions for others are not positive.
American tech companies take your data and sell it to advertisers, I don't like it, but they do. The US government only accesses it if they have a reason to do so and subpoena the specific information needed. The Chinese government? I have no doubt that they're collecting data for much more nefarious purposes. Intelligence indicates that they've been improving their military forces massively in the last several decades. It wouldn't be hard for them to subtly start slipping in propaganda into the tiktok feeds of countries they intend to invade, and then they'll have local-national support.
I think it's easy to look at this and say objectively that it's worse. If Youtube or Facebook were owned by France or Germany I would hold the same belief that tiktok is worse. It's not fear of some mysterious "other", but fear of a proven enemy to freedom and human rights, China.
As Snowden revelations have shown, this is not the case.
> It wouldn't be hard for them to subtly start slipping in propaganda into the tiktok feeds of countries they intend to invade
Last time I checked, the USA were the number one warmonger in the world, sometimes by lying about WMD and going against the vote of the UN.
I'm not defending China, I do think Tiktok is a dictatorship honeypot, but the USA is only good to the USA. A cancer is worst than diabetes, but I still don't think diabetes is a good thing.
And google is only good to google.
I'm in the good graces of neither, being in Europe, and consider both as services that will try to get as much of me as possible when I use them. And the minute our interest are not aligned with theirs, they will bite us.
I don't want to enter this debate because it detracts from the main point, but the US has been putting Latino people in concentration camps.
As a fellow frenchman I can only agree with what was said before: TikTok is bad, but Youtube isn't much better.
This is a bad faith comparison
Lets not forget the war time concentration camps in the US, or the torture camps, or the rendition programme, or gitmo.
But yes, tiktok is trash. But it is the trash that the people love.
Wouldn’t this be an argument for preferring TikTok over YouTube?
There is literally nothing China can do to me as long as I stay firmly in the West. On the other hand, I could very well be sold out by Google to the US government, which could easily have me extradited from the EU.
If you use TikTok they can manipulate what you see.
But K-12 in the US tries to hammer so much “so misleading it might as well be false” pro-America propaganda during exactly the age that kids are generally rebelling against anything authority tells them that’s it’s not all that surprising that during a major economic downturn that’s only benefiting those with capital that people would start to have a distaste for the system that produced this mess.
The irony of this is telling. I have to assume you are unvaccinated, and unaware that you are being publicly critical of the government.
I just think it’s weird to attribute the things you are complaining about to ‘capitalism’, and that if you are going to make such broad statements, then it’s weird to claim there are no benefits to those ‘without capital’ when there plainly are.
I happen to also be critical of most of the things you are criticizing. Blaming ‘capitalism’ doesn’t seem to offer anything. The word has become interchangeable with ‘the bogeyman’.
I largely disagree with the first half of this, and agree with the second half. I think ‘individualism’ is a chimera and not a cause.
I do agree that Americans are generally more suspicious of the state than people in most other countries, but that’s to be expected given both the founding and history of the country, and the experiences of minorities.
On the other hand, the disconnectedness of those in power and the lack of solutions is definitely evident.
My dislike of ‘anti-capitalism’ is that is just a complaint, but without any solutions.
Which I think is awesome personally but I get how some people will see all of that as huge red flags.
You don’t think that is a result of manipulation?
There are numerous Uyghurs in the West who would disagree with your assessment given the harassments they have had to endure. This will only become worse as China continues to become more powerful.
All the "data gathering" mentioned in all the FUD around tiktok in recent years is done by google/facebook too, and noone mentiones it at all.
Note that non american feel the same way about google, netflix, amazon &co
But I still think that 'chinese company owning a majority of internet video traffic' is WAY more scary than 'US company owning a majority of internet traffic'. Maybe thats just bias, maybe not.
But yes, I think there should be more relevant non-US big IT players to add more variety. But for a lot of reasons, the EU, and especially germany, just does not cut it in regard of IT expertise anymore. I am not saying this from a perspective of "disappointed patriotism" or something like that. Its more about having more choice would make thinks more interessting.
But on the other hand: more choice makes thinks like movie streaming less attractive. I do not want to have to sign with Netflix, Amazon, Disney, HBO, Apple TV AND Maxdome.
I guess we still cannot have the cake, and eat it, too.
No maybe about it, it is.
The USA has its problems, but they are all extremely publicized compared to the secret nightmare going on in China.
I have noticed that there are armies of Chinese and Russian shill accounts on HN now that brigade with "whataboutisms" whenever criticism of Putin or Jinping's dictatorships arise.
Tiktok gives your data to China. I don't know what they are doing with it but they are not using it for better targetted ads. I guess when they request permission for my phone contacts, clipboard content, private photos at least I know they aren't using it for ads.
TikTok is imo goddamn scary. It is explicitly set up to hook people with gamification techniques, showering likes on new users so they come back for more. Only the subject matter is often politics, activism and intertribal warfare.
* Not that the US would be interested in me personally either. But they do take an interest in citizens from other countries.
Being a US-based company doesn't make this any better, just look at Facebook.
The only people who worry are people on HN. Most other people aren't aware of what's going on, or just don't care.
Letting that on your phone is allowing your contacts, photos and text messages to be read.
Same goes with facebook. But facebook will try to profit off of your data. Tiktok data goes to China. I don't know what they are doing with it..
FB data also goes to the US government. I don't know what they are doing with it..
One reason China does it to monitor and control their own people. Speaking out against China in the west will often put family in China at risk and any business interests. Monitoring journalist, tracking western movement, cyberwar faire, are all reasons.
China want to blackmail me to do their bidding. I dont actually have much shame, so probably wont work so good.
There are days where I think the lesser of two evils when it comes to invading my privacy might be the regime whos jurisdiction I am not, and likely never will be present in.
Where does it read text messages?
I wouldn't be nearly as worried if Tiktok were owned by Italy or Germany or France. But China, with it'a ongoing genocide of Muslims and totalitarian oppression, yeah that is worse than Netflix selling your data to advertisers.
It's also clearly designed around a different experience, a constant consume-or-scroll feed as popularized by Instagram. YouTube shorts also has this, but regular YouTube clearly doesn't, given that there's just enough latency between video skips that it feels like the algorithm is "making mistakes" at a much lower number of skips.
The algo also doesnt seem to get the hint - it suggests a video over and over again, an no matter how many times I dont ever watch a video on X channel or on Y subject, it keeps on trying.
While I am complaining, Netflix algo is getting worse too. Stop reccomending the movie I watched earlier in the week, I watched it. I clicked thumbs down on it. I dont want to waste another 90 minutes on it.
Unless you've read some new news I haven't, not any more than Google (YouTube) or Facebook have. Why is TikTok different?
Try watching this video on Youtube without giving Google your passport or credit card info. I found it impossible, even with youtube-dl.
As opposed to whomever controls Facebook/Google?
The ship has sailed. And with upcoming decentralized web technologies that ship will cross the point of no return.
Even the "china controls it" part isn't persuasive because, I mean, what isn't china influencing these days? And TBH I don't give a shit if it's Chinese or American powers collecting my information, I don't want either of them doing it. And consider that these American corporations influence other nations in the same way China may influence America and they accept it -- of course Americans would accept it too.
My word to people who hate TikTok's privacy invading tech and practices is to lobby to pass a sweeping privacy law or shut up, basically. But that would mean wrecking a huge part of the parasitic tech industry so it's not going to happen.
Money > ethics.
Even if you use the website?
this just complete fear mongering, let the kids play on it.
What has this got to do with TikTok?
Beyond that, the data collection and the way it mixes young-but-of-age mildly sexual content with underage guys imitating them makes me stay far away. I enjoyed the handsome men in various states of undress but couldn’t find a way to make the app not veer into underage content, no matter how many times I told it what I liked. Disturbing.
What's concerning about this? I don't mean this rhetorically: I'm genuinely curious, as I've heard people say similar things recently.
It seems to me that, like metabolic health, there's a pretty large body of basic mental health advice that's safe and salutary, and that doesn't displace heavy-duty mental Healthcare for those who need it (in the same way that healthy recipe tips don't displace insulin shots).
Concretely, what privacy concern do you see in watching a video with mental health tips? Do you think this privacy concern similarly extends to reading a Wikipedia article on (eg) CBT techniques?
Or am I misunderstanding, and "Mental health tiktok" involves users describing their mental health issues in videos that they post, and a back-and-forth with those who are claiming to "treat" them?
This is worth elaborating on, since I know HN tends to have a bizarre fantasy conception of the medical system where patients arent supposed to understand anything that's happening. I have to wonder if the HNers contributing to this conception have ever engaged with the medical system, or if they have, I have to pity those that they're responsible for.
There are plenty of doctors in my family, and I've been responsible for managing both chronic and severe acute health issues for family members. Every single one of the doctors I've been in contact with would be shocked by the notion that patients shouldn't be informing thenselves at a basic level. This goes quadruply for basic preventive measures like nutrition, exercise, or basic mental health practices: there's a reason that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure".
Eg,
> Cheng believes the website that doxed him by publishing his personal information online was started by pro-Beijing supporters in Hong Kong.
> “I feel fear,” he admitted. His family, too, was scared and told him not to walk home alone anymore. But part of Cheng remains defiant as he considers the doxing website a component of a larger campaign to incite fear in protesters as mass demonstrations continue into their third month.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rosalindadams/hong-kong...
https://mashable.com/article/doj-accuses-zoom-employee-china...
The premise of my pushing back against privacy concerns was mental health advice of the basic, fundamental kind: mindfulness, productive thought patterns, healthy work habits, sleep hygiene, etc etc etc.
Even taking for granted that tiktok's access to this information is scarier than eg Google's, the signal they can glean from this type of usage is little more than "I get anxious sometimes", not things like "I have bipolar disorder". I don't think it's controversial at all to say that getting advice for serious mental disorders via social network isn't a good idea for multiple reasons (again, this is why I clarified with the OP of the story what sort of mental health advice they were seeking).
To make it clear by analogy: one maintains their physical health through a million 24/7 day-to-day decisions, and nobody would blink twice at getting information about eg yoga or healthy recipes from YouTube or other non-medical sources. OTOH, trying to treat your pneumonia or MS via YouTube or tiktok would be an obvious disaster. Similarly, there are a million and one day-to-day actions one takes to maintain their mental health, eg mindfulness or other basic CBT techniques. Researching these independently is not just harmless, it's what people _should_ be doing, regardless of whether they're also seeking treatment (and the privacy concerns are similarly minimal). Again in stark contrast, serious mental health issues shouldn't be treated via casual research.
Also, the English Wikipedia article on cognitive behavioural therapy cites Cochrane reviews, psych textbooks and a whole volley of journal articles from prestigious journals like the Lancet and the Journal of the American Medical Association etc. describing clinical trial results, plus guidance from the UK's National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence.
Presumably, the TikTok version makes up for this by having a better dance routine.
Yes, of course. I wasn't clear, but I was referring to going through a search engine, not going directly to Wikipedia.
> Presumably, the TikTok version makes up for this by having a better dance routine.
I'm afraid you've completely misunderstood what this subthread is about. The _quality_ of medical information and the privacy concerns involved in finding it (whether through Google or via tiktok's algorithm) are completely different topics. To be honest, I can't imagine how anyone could read these comments and come away thinking any comparison was being made (let alone equivalence being drawn) between quality vs privacy concerns.
If the key variable is the search engine, then, yes, you probably don't want to be feeding details of your possible mental health problems into Google. Maybe DuckDuckGo would be preferable. Once you've put your symptoms or diagnosis into a search engine, where you end up is going to likely not be the main issue. If you type, say, "autism spectrum disorder" into Google, Google will make certain assumptions about you regardless of whether you end up clicking on a Wikipedia link, an NHS.uk link, some academic paper on bioRxiv, or a TikTok video with someone describing their autism diagnosis.
It struck me as the kind of thing that leads people to, for example, ingeste chloroquine phosphate [0] on the advice of a celebrity.
[0]https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/24/coronavirus-cu...
Gotcha, thanks for clarifying!
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/09/biden-revokes-and-replaces-t...