Watching the meeting with the TikTok CEO and I was wondering. If this ban does go through, can’t we just use a VPN to bypass it? How about side loading? Banning one app through government power doesn’t seem right.
I use TikTok, and the data it collects is the same as other social media. I don’t believe banning an app is the answer, because it’s a slippy slope for free speech in my opinion. “I hear oh China banned this so it’s fair to ban that”, well two wrongs don’t make a right. Also your forgetting the TikTok is banned in China and based in Singapore… There are better options than banning speech over the main issue with the social media landscape, DATA, like a GDPR law over here.
And, fuck China. Fuck them hard, but honestly if we want to be stronger than them, we should be reasonable and not cut of speech and focus what really matters, data laws. Still, fuck China.
Edit: I now know it’s based in China and not in Singapore, but apparently asking genuine question like this nets you downvotes? I’m new to Reddit and this is not a good first impression for a site that promotes upvotes and downvotes on basis of discussion and if the topic fits or not.
It’s social media. If it’s banned, then the vast majority of users will give up on it, meaning no content, meaning no reason to go. It also means all of those people will migrate somewhere else, so everyone else will want to migrate somewhere else, which is what always happens with social media. TikTok was always going to be ephemeral. Whether it dies by government decree this year or boredom in five years makes little difference.
Also your forgetting the TikTok is banned in China and based in Singapore
No it’s not. It’s absolutely a Chinese company based in China. They just have two different versions of it: Douyin for inside China and TikTok for outside China. Same app features, same logo even, just different databases that it connects to.
Man I hope it gets banned
That hearing was an absolute shit show for Tik Tok. Their approach of claiming that “Tik Tok is totally enmeshed into American culture and society” was a terrible idea.
As huge as TikTok is, what it does can easily be done by another app. A ban on it means that it’s pretty much done as the average user isn’t going to make the effort to access it via VPN and side loading.
One app sunsets for whatever reason, another one sunrise and that’s pretty much the story of social media apps
The problem is the Tik Tok app has access to your contact list, photos, text messages, e-mails, your clipboard, and other files.
This is why many corporations have banned Tik Tok from being installed on corporate devices. The corporation that I work for told people to uninstall the app and then remotely scanned everyone’s devices to make sure it was removed.
Sure, most people are too lazy to do that and will just move to another app that isn’t that complicated to get to work.
Ignoring that it will also be removed from US app stores which means you’re going to have to download it elsewhere which again, most people don’t want to do.
Itd be best if tik tok was banned. I was talked into getting one and my god, people on there are have no common sense whatsoever lol. Best if we didn’t indulge in that kind of stuff
I think TikTok has a lot more security flaws than most apps.
And while you can use a VPN to access a website, it will be tough to get the application on your phone after the app stores drop it. Sure it is possible, and is easier on Android phones, but the amount of hoops you would need to jump through would be a bit too much for the common user.
As far as morality goes, free speech and expression shouldn’t be above your safety and well being, including the safety of your personal data. We don’t condone harassment, for example, because it puts other people in danger. Your private data, when given to the wrong hands, can really screw you over.
Maybe, but most probably won’t. It just opens the market for more tech apps to become popular, so it doesn’t really matter in the long run. What’s popular now is fleeting.
If you want to be colluding with China.
Looks like TikTok might not have a leg to Douyin on after all.
CEO is based in Singapore, that’s why I said Singapore.
Edit: Seriously? Downvoted for this? I thought upvotes and downvotes contribute to discussion? If explaining why I think it is and learning more about the situation is also a factor in that which I thank you is worthy of downvotes, then the voting system of Reddit should be massively been improved on instead of a glorying disagree button.
Never knew it’s all based in China.
But if it’s banned just in the US, I doubt it will have any impact on the amount of content you can get. Tiktok has over a billion active monthly users and only 100 million of those users are Americans
I have a feeling this will end up resulting in (even more) malicious versions of the app being unleashed on unsuspecting side loaders. Banning the app will solve nothing and just create new problems.
CEO is based in Singapore, that’s why I said Singapore.
The CEO of “TikTok” is from Singapore but corporate structure complications aside, that’s really just a subsidiary of ByteDance, the Chinese-run, Beijing-based parent company that’s actually in charge.
The CEO could be based in the US itself and the banning conversation would still be on. The company which actually owns it is very much a Chinese company, subject to the ruling party of China. There is a major difference between what Facebook is doing and what TikTok is collecting for multiple reasons as well. Facebooks data mostly stays in western nations and is collected through an app which generally does not keep getting caught violating permissions on it’s home device. The TikTok app is a virus everyone has decided is amusing.
American users are naturally going to disproportionately follow American users. English-speaking TikTok will be a graveyard if it loses its American users.
I work in IT, the security experts at the company looked at the app and had information from other security experts to make a decision on banning the app from all company owned devices.
