As we’ve seen in the past couple of weeks, social media companies based in the US are also vulnerable to US government interference — but that’s the way they like it.
They released a Marty Rimm-level report citing that pro-Palestinian was mentioned more than pro-Israeli content in ratios that differed from Meta products. This was the 'smoking gun' of manipulation when it's more of a sign Meta was the one doing the manipulation.
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2023/6/7/china-spied-on-ho...
Every major social media and dating application has a law enforcement portal. This was documented in BlueLeaks.
But, this is done under the guise of commercial interests, usually advertising, so it's okay?
The only problem with democracy is that it's so fragile and susceptible to bad non-democrat actors intervention, which is more of an awareness problem.
I’d argue the TikTok remedy should be applied to X, too.
Companies in China (and especially those of prominence) have formal structures and regulations that require them to cooperate with the government, and sometimes require the companies to allow the government to intervene in operations if necessary.
It is not possible for a CCP official to show up to a board meeting at X and direct the company to take some action, because that isn't how US corporations work.
But regardless, there is a huge difference between a request and actually having managerial authority -- the most obvious being that someone with managerial authority can simply do whatever they want without trying to compel someone else. Also, X, being subject to US law, must comply with that no matter what consequences Musk is threatened with. So, any threats may have limits in what they can practically accomplish.