Facebook paid GOP firm to malign TikTok | Hacker News Reader

Facebook paid GOP firm to malign TikTok

washingtonpost.com

73 pointsaurareturn19 comments

I'm not defending Meta here. I fervently wish the company would implode.

But regardless of motivations, is there still merit in their arguments against TikTok?

The only truly "wrong" claim that I detect is the implicit argument that TikTok's ties to the CCP / PLA are the highest priority national security threat that needs urgent attention.

The Tiktok ban is an attempt to herd the Tiktok customers to Meta products. Nothing more.

Although there already is some overlap, younger generations would not adapt easily to a different platform; also the new US administration has different plans than the past one, and from their perspective controlling TikTok is way more useful than destroying it.

Based off of the way President Trump is characterized and how he acts behind the scenes in Bob Woodward's reporting on his presidency/campaigning, my suspicion is that Trump has offered a lifeline to TikTok for two reasons: A) he wants to look like the "hero" in the media, which is always important to him; and B) he wants to use the threat of banning TikTok as leverage to get something from China and Xi.

I'd pay attention to any talk of deals or tariffs with China in the next few months to learn the true fate of TikTok.

It smells more like, "About that sale, let me give you more time to reconsider.", I can imagine Elmo would be interested in seizing more eyeballs for his great "jokes and memes" as well as owning yet another communication medium for his supported "Anti-Woke"-movement, but sadly for him TikTok isn't willing to surrender so far.

And Zuck has nakedly been shown to be the opportunitist, so he doesn't want to lose this chance either.

In your opinion. That's not the rationale proffered in the legislation however.

because politicians are honest and don't lie, right?

It also wasn't the rationale proffered in the arguments to the US Court of Appeals or Supreme Court.

There was no evidence disclosed, the "arguments" ha!, are speculation based on hearsay, and nothing else. The whole episode shows a disregard for the US constitution and mountains of legal precident on these matters. 170 million citizens made a choice, and they have been denied any disclosure as to why they are being prohibited from conducting there own affairs and business, under the guise of national security, backed up with may,might,could. Good look, that.

What evidence did you expect them to disclose? If it's a matter of national security, it's not going to be released publicly.

> The whole episode shows a disregard for the US constitution and mountains of legal precident on these matters.

I disagree. There's plenty of precedent for this, we have laws on the books for over 100 years that prevent foreign ownership of American media. In those days it was newspapers, radio and later tv stations – in fact those laws a large part of why Rupert Murdoch became an American citizen.

This law is just the modern version of those previous laws. You might disagree with them, but there's plenty of precedent.

Many other reasons to ban TikTok, including many examples related to national security already in place for the US and its allies on government and military devices.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_of_TikTok

https://archive.ph/Lpu7G

(2022)

I suspected at least one of the other social media platforms did something like this. Why compete when you can pay to win

The game is the game

And the only way to win (for us peons) is not to play.

This is going to be one of those things where people look back in 50 years and the motives and playbook will be so obvious

you mean 50 days, right? :)

(normal oligarchical politics)

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