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Comment by maria2 | Hacker News Reader

This has nothing to do with user data. People are influenced by the content they see on social media. Allowing a foreign adversary to run the main information network for an entire generation of the population is not a wise move.

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What is a "main information network?" Are websites ok? Podcasts?

I don't think you realize how widespread Tiktok usage is. I can reliably predict what Tiktok users will talk about in social events just by a few minutes of browsing that week's top.

What line has TikTok crossed, specifically? Is it just the content? Global reach? Data governance? User count?

I too can predict conversation topics based on what's trending in Twitter. But Twitter is now owned (in part) by investors representing foreign interests, including KSA [1]. Recent editorial changes at Twitter have amplified "unamerican" rhetoric [2]. Does Twitter cross the same lines as TikTok?

Any "solution" that bans TikTok would leave behind a far-reaching precedent, one that is completely ineffective at dealing with the core problem. Trying to stand up a virtual iron curtain won't sit well with an american userbase that's accustomed to choosing the content they want.

Also, if there's one thing you can do to make young people more captivated and curious about something - make it forbidden.

[1] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/28/saudis-kingdom-hol...

[2] https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7zm9q/elon-musk-twitter-naz...

Because by association you are receiving the same recommendations. I doubt that this is true over heterogenic, random assemblies.

TikTok has 138 million MAU (in the U.S.) and the average TikTok user spend 95 minutes per day in the app. I'm unaware of a podcast that has that type of reach.

Source: https://wallaroomedia.com/blog/social-media/tiktok-statistic...

Joe Rogan's podcast probably comes close, with multiple three hour or more episodes each week, though he does take breaks, which TikTok does not.

His podcast gets around 11 million listeners, so off by over an order of magnitude.

HN posters are in love with the "people are too stupid to think for themselves and need me to protect them" narrative. Nowhere else do I see that line of thought as frequently as I see it here. Not even Reddit pushes that justification for controlling the ability of others to access whatever media sources they want as much as it is pushed here. We truly must be the intellectual giants of humanity to know so consistently what is best for everyone else.

What's weird is when people imply that opinions form from the ether, rather than from interaction with the cultural conversation.

There's nothing that can be done about that reality, so we have to worry about people and mechanisms that have control over that conversation.

It should not sound unreasonable to worry about an adversarial country possessing what amounts to a gigantic, unauditable mind control machine.

Let's say that the nation of Lalaland is has a state-owned company whose product is a social network that's popular among Americans. Lalaland decides that one particular candidate in the next US election is beneficial to their country's trade/security/etc. The social network strategically shows "go out and vote" content to the demographics most likely to vote for the candidate they would like in office.

Is this ok? Were any of those people on the social network "stupid" if they were more likely to vote after seeing targeted content?

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