What is RedNote?
January 14, 2025 6:56 AM Subscribe
American users are turning to RedNote, the Chinese equivalent of Instagram/Pinterest, ahead of a looming TikTok ban, which legislators are now urging Biden to extend the Jan 19 deadline for. TikTok has called rumors that it is considering a sale to Elon Musk, "pure fiction", and its parent company ByteDance has said that it would shut down rather than sell to an American buyer.
Americans and Chinese netizens are currently having a lot of fun with each other on RedNote - helping each other with homework, and making memes.
Americans and Chinese netizens are currently having a lot of fun with each other on RedNote - helping each other with homework, and making memes.
On Friday, Justice Brett Kavanaugh reiterated that Congress and President Biden were worried China’s government could easily access the data of American users. Ultimately, that data could be used to blackmail users and potentially turn some users into foreign assets, he supposed.
Unlike Twitter and Facebook and their owners who are absolutely not under foreign influence at all and definitely not using data of American users for anything untoward.
posted by slimepuppy at 7:25 AM on January 14 [68 favorites]
Unlike Twitter and Facebook and their owners who are absolutely not under foreign influence at all and definitely not using data of American users for anything untoward.
posted by slimepuppy at 7:25 AM on January 14 [68 favorites]
It's hilarious.
Let's not forget that one of the reasons TikTok is being banned is because of pro-Palestinian content, one of the things that the Chinese government did not bother to censor. I'm always remembering Ai Wei Wei's statement that Western censorship is worse and "more concealed" than Chinese censorship. “Unlike traditional authoritarian regimes that directly target individual speech, censorship in the West manifests itself more subtly within the framework of so-called democratic politics and the broader concept of so-called freedom of speech. Criticism and dissenting thoughts that diverge from the established values and corporate interests are often subjected to censorship to varying degrees.”
posted by toastyk at 7:28 AM on January 14 [33 favorites]
Let's not forget that one of the reasons TikTok is being banned is because of pro-Palestinian content, one of the things that the Chinese government did not bother to censor. I'm always remembering Ai Wei Wei's statement that Western censorship is worse and "more concealed" than Chinese censorship. “Unlike traditional authoritarian regimes that directly target individual speech, censorship in the West manifests itself more subtly within the framework of so-called democratic politics and the broader concept of so-called freedom of speech. Criticism and dissenting thoughts that diverge from the established values and corporate interests are often subjected to censorship to varying degrees.”
posted by toastyk at 7:28 AM on January 14 [33 favorites]
As a heavy TikTok user, I've been following this with great interest and even signed up for Red Note.
'Cause it doesn't take a rocket science to recognize that Facebook, Twitter, Insta, and all the rest are very problematic in their own way. Using any of these platforms means accepting that company is absolutely going to get all the information about and out of you that they can. So what does it matter if the platform is owned by foreign government with some hostile intentions when your own government doesn't seem to give a shit about you?
This doesn't mean I'm more open to China's form of government or philosophies. It does mean I am questioning (again!) what the fuck my bèn dàn government is doing and they have no one to blame on that front but themselves
*goes back to learning Mandarin Chinese*
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:36 AM on January 14 [14 favorites]
'Cause it doesn't take a rocket science to recognize that Facebook, Twitter, Insta, and all the rest are very problematic in their own way. Using any of these platforms means accepting that company is absolutely going to get all the information about and out of you that they can. So what does it matter if the platform is owned by foreign government with some hostile intentions when your own government doesn't seem to give a shit about you?
This doesn't mean I'm more open to China's form of government or philosophies. It does mean I am questioning (again!) what the fuck my bèn dàn government is doing and they have no one to blame on that front but themselves
*goes back to learning Mandarin Chinese*
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:36 AM on January 14 [14 favorites]
It's not that we shouldn't ban Tiktok, it's that we should also ban Facebook and Twitter, etc.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:40 AM on January 14 [55 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 7:40 AM on January 14 [55 favorites]
I think that the big social media companies should get nationalized, and run and regulated as public utilities. But that's my answer to pretty much everything, so YMMV.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 7:43 AM on January 14 [34 favorites]
posted by mrjohnmuller at 7:43 AM on January 14 [34 favorites]
I think that the big social media companies should get nationalized, and run and regulated as public utilities.
Well. they should be federalised. By the EU.
posted by ambrosen at 7:46 AM on January 14 [13 favorites]
Well. they should be federalised. By the EU.
posted by ambrosen at 7:46 AM on January 14 [13 favorites]
It's at least a little funny that in response to the US banning TikTok due to alleged Chinese Communist influence, Americans are jumping ship to a Chinese platform named "little red book."
at this point it really does come across as trolling doesn't it
posted by ginger.beef at 7:49 AM on January 14 [9 favorites]
at this point it really does come across as trolling doesn't it
posted by ginger.beef at 7:49 AM on January 14 [9 favorites]
I wonder why the move to Red Note/Little Red Book rather than getting a VPN? Is it the small cost involved to get a foreign IP? I'm really looking forward to Canadian TikTok.
posted by advicepig at 7:51 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
posted by advicepig at 7:51 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
Getting and using a VPN is way beyond the technical capabilities of most people, I think.
posted by Ampersand692 at 7:52 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
posted by Ampersand692 at 7:52 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
Nationalizing large tech companies under the incoming regime probably isn't going to end well...
posted by constraint at 7:52 AM on January 14 [17 favorites]
posted by constraint at 7:52 AM on January 14 [17 favorites]
I'm really looking forward to Canadian TikTok.
I got bad news for you
posted by monkeymike at 7:59 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
I got bad news for you
posted by monkeymike at 7:59 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
I've never been in TikTok, although I've seen plenty of videos reposted elsewhere. I know that a lot of people are upset over this but I believe the concerns of CCP influence are totally plausible. Then again, everybody is harvesting data from you now no matter what platform you're on.
posted by tommasz at 8:06 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
posted by tommasz at 8:06 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
I'd like some more corroboration that this is "a thing" -- the fact that the app is the top of US iPhone rankings is significant but what does that mean, and is it possible to spoof an iPhone in China to look like it's from the US, which would be an obvious tactic to avoid censorship in China? When they make it sound like Americans are "flocking" to it, is it like, a couple hundred loud influencers? Or just China propaganda with an obvious ironic hook to get a foothold in American news, thus ensuring more Americans sign up for it?
Speaking of letting China into your phone: I ordered a super cheap clock on Amazon, which has bluetooth so it will sync its time with your phone for accuracy, but when you connect it to your phone, it shows up as a "headset" with two-way audio capabilities, and it prompts that it needs access to "messages", and it won't autosync the time unless you say OK to this access (it also won't autosync with a bluetooth-enabled laptop, it has to be a phone). So, I cheerfully greet my Chinese-spy listeners when I spend time in my office, which would be very boring for them otherwise.
posted by AzraelBrown at 8:08 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Speaking of letting China into your phone: I ordered a super cheap clock on Amazon, which has bluetooth so it will sync its time with your phone for accuracy, but when you connect it to your phone, it shows up as a "headset" with two-way audio capabilities, and it prompts that it needs access to "messages", and it won't autosync the time unless you say OK to this access (it also won't autosync with a bluetooth-enabled laptop, it has to be a phone). So, I cheerfully greet my Chinese-spy listeners when I spend time in my office, which would be very boring for them otherwise.
posted by AzraelBrown at 8:08 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
So after being notified it's a bad idea to have a TikTok account because of China, y'all are...getting another Chinese only account?!?!I know, the US is stupid and voted for Trump.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:14 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:14 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Trump's migration from I have heard this Chinese app is VERY BAD! We should ban it! to Wait, I am popular on this app and donors want me to save it? STOP THE BAN! would be pathetic enough. But it's even worse because of the intermediate step where the infosec world saw several of its worst fears about TikTok come true, as it nearly ruined elections in multiple countries.
In the end, it isn't the part where TikTok is dangerous, easily manipulated, and can be used as a tool to swing elections that bothers him. It's the part where it's Chinese.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:15 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
In the end, it isn't the part where TikTok is dangerous, easily manipulated, and can be used as a tool to swing elections that bothers him. It's the part where it's Chinese.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:15 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
I'd like some more corroboration that this is "a thing" -- the fact that the app is the top of US iPhone rankings is significant but what does that mean, and is it possible to spoof an iPhone in China to look like it's from the US, which would be an obvious tactic to avoid censorship in China? When they make it sound like Americans are "flocking" to it, is it like, a couple hundred loud influencers? Or just China propaganda with an obvious ironic hook to get a foothold in American news, thus ensuring more Americans sign up for it?
I agree with this, it's all very funny but I don't think a ton of Americans are signing up for an app that is by default in Mandarin (and even the language change only gets you to mostly English).
posted by grandiloquiet at 8:18 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
I agree with this, it's all very funny but I don't think a ton of Americans are signing up for an app that is by default in Mandarin (and even the language change only gets you to mostly English).
posted by grandiloquiet at 8:18 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Rednote's terms of service has plenty of wiggle room to surprise current TikTok LGBTQ+ users looking for a new space.
Yes it's a real thing (a migration) at last from the hundreds of posts I watched last night ... where I spent some time trying to remind folks that censorship works differently in China.
Specifically re Content Restrictions:
* No "Bad Information": The agreement broadly prohibits "bad information," which includes content that harms public order, social stability, or violates "moral standards." This vague language could be used to restrict LGBTQ+ content if it's deemed to violate these undefined standards.
* No "Harmful to Minors": Content considered harmful to minors is also prohibited. This could potentially be used to censor content depicting LGBTQ+ relationships or identities.
A different land grab is underway to an app called Neptune that claims it's "queer woman owned and built", only contact info I can find is a discord server
posted by Lenie Clarke at 8:23 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
Yes it's a real thing (a migration) at last from the hundreds of posts I watched last night ... where I spent some time trying to remind folks that censorship works differently in China.
Specifically re Content Restrictions:
* No "Bad Information": The agreement broadly prohibits "bad information," which includes content that harms public order, social stability, or violates "moral standards." This vague language could be used to restrict LGBTQ+ content if it's deemed to violate these undefined standards.
* No "Harmful to Minors": Content considered harmful to minors is also prohibited. This could potentially be used to censor content depicting LGBTQ+ relationships or identities.
A different land grab is underway to an app called Neptune that claims it's "queer woman owned and built", only contact info I can find is a discord server
posted by Lenie Clarke at 8:23 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
I have a VPN and I don't know how to use it very well (husband bought it in a bit of post-election panic purchasing.) I think I can still watch videos on it but the app itself, on my phone, will deteriorate slowly, if it's not killed off altogether?
posted by PussKillian at 8:23 AM on January 14 [1 favorite]
posted by PussKillian at 8:23 AM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Let's not forget that one of the reasons TikTok is being banned is because of pro-Palestinian content
Texas banned TikTok in February 2023, so it was going to happen anyway. What starts here changes the world.
posted by tofu_crouton at 8:32 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
Texas banned TikTok in February 2023, so it was going to happen anyway. What starts here changes the world.
posted by tofu_crouton at 8:32 AM on January 14 [2 favorites]
I'm really looking forward to Canadian TikTok.
RedGreenBook?
posted by BungaDunga at 8:38 AM on January 14 [42 favorites]
RedGreenBook?
posted by BungaDunga at 8:38 AM on January 14 [42 favorites]
From probably-not-just-an-AI-slop-site Her Campus:
Neptune is a TikTok alternative that’s being offered up as the next app for users to download. Developed by CEO Ashley Darling, Neptune is a female-owned app making waves on TikTok due to its promising interface, community-first approach, and proposed ghost metrics. It also promises monetization, which is a plus for any creators looking to jump ship if TikTok ends up sinking.posted by Lenie Clarke at 8:39 AM on January 14 [1 favorite]
On Neptune’s website, it describes itself as a “platform built for creators, by creatives” and claims to be “pioneering a new era of social media.” Neptune also says that it was designed to put content creators first, ensuring that their creativity takes precedence over things like views, likes, and followers.
...
If you’re looking to download right TF now, sorry — you’ll have to wait a bit. The Neptune app is currently in the beta phase and is only available for users registered to their Discord community. But, if you’re interested in possibly becoming a beta tester, you can sign up now (well, after you join the Neptune Discord server, that is).
Let's not forget that one of the reasons TikTok is being banned is because of pro-Palestinian content
Trump tried to ban TikTok in 2020, back when pro-Palestinian content was simply not what anyone in the halls of power were paying any attention to. This has been coming for a while.
I'd wager a guess that the TikTok algorithm is good enough that most Americans do not get pro-Palestinian content on TikTok, because most Americans are not that interested. The people who do get lots of pro-Palestinian content on TikTok are seeing it because the algorithm thinks they'd be interested, but it's not a universal experience on the site.
posted by BungaDunga at 8:43 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
Trump tried to ban TikTok in 2020, back when pro-Palestinian content was simply not what anyone in the halls of power were paying any attention to. This has been coming for a while.
I'd wager a guess that the TikTok algorithm is good enough that most Americans do not get pro-Palestinian content on TikTok, because most Americans are not that interested. The people who do get lots of pro-Palestinian content on TikTok are seeing it because the algorithm thinks they'd be interested, but it's not a universal experience on the site.
posted by BungaDunga at 8:43 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
So after being notified it's a bad idea to have a TikTok account because of China, y'all are...getting another Chinese only account?!?!I know, the US is stupid and voted for Trump.
A lot of U.S. TikTok users I know say they don't much care if the Chinese government knows what videos they watch and aren't convinced China couldn't buy or steal that info, and other data like location logs that TikTok might gather, through some other channel if they really wanted it.
One common sentiment I hear—often especially in light of Trump—is that people would rather this information be in the hands of the Chinese government, which they have no relationship with, than the US government, which has all kinds of ways to retaliate against US residents.
posted by smelendez at 8:45 AM on January 14 [20 favorites]
A lot of U.S. TikTok users I know say they don't much care if the Chinese government knows what videos they watch and aren't convinced China couldn't buy or steal that info, and other data like location logs that TikTok might gather, through some other channel if they really wanted it.
One common sentiment I hear—often especially in light of Trump—is that people would rather this information be in the hands of the Chinese government, which they have no relationship with, than the US government, which has all kinds of ways to retaliate against US residents.
posted by smelendez at 8:45 AM on January 14 [20 favorites]
Okay, I am utterly fascinated about this development and I kinda love this BlueSky thread explaining why this is fascinating!
posted by Kitteh at 8:45 AM on January 14 [15 favorites]
posted by Kitteh at 8:45 AM on January 14 [15 favorites]
I'll be honest, I don't know what she's taking about when she says "US gov't has spent 30 years telling us how horrible China is, but....their groceries are cheap, high quality..."
Uh, I seem to have missed the US government propaganda campaign telling Americans that Chinese people are all living in poverty and eating expensive groceries. What?
posted by BungaDunga at 8:51 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Uh, I seem to have missed the US government propaganda campaign telling Americans that Chinese people are all living in poverty and eating expensive groceries. What?
posted by BungaDunga at 8:51 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Kitteh, that thread.... I don't know... feels to me that she's extrapolating from anecdata she's seen. I do not believe for a minute 170 millions Americans will start using red note and then have meaningful enough conversation with Chinese citizens that'll change their view of China and the US government/capitalism.
Not that the US gov can't be terrible or that Meta/Twitter/etc aren't terrible corporations, but we just had a whole election showing American making terrible choices... not buying that a few days on a different social media app will change that.
posted by WaterAndPixels at 8:59 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Not that the US gov can't be terrible or that Meta/Twitter/etc aren't terrible corporations, but we just had a whole election showing American making terrible choices... not buying that a few days on a different social media app will change that.
posted by WaterAndPixels at 8:59 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
The people who do get lots of pro-Palestinian content on TikTok are seeing it because the algorithm thinks they'd be interested, but it's not a universal experience on the site.
And, to riff on this a little, the highly personalized nature of TikTok means that it can be anything to everyone. "But aren't Americans all getting pro-Palestine info from it"- no, they aren't. You are because you're interested. There's probably Zionist TikTok that you're not seeing because the algorithm is just that good. Whether it actually tilts one way or another, or gives people unvarnished access to information, is basically impossible to say, because everyone sees a different TikTok.
This also means that members of Congress almost certainly have no idea that there's a bunch of pro-Palestinian content on there because they and their aides never see it. How would they know to worry about it? At most someone's nephew or grandchild might send them something. It's not like Twitter where there was a semi-national "conversation" that most pols and journos participated in. If they were really worried about Palestinian content there would have been Congressional hearings filled with allegations about "Hamas" and "terrorism," which I don't recall. This was a Congressional initiative and it's usually fairly clear what is on their minds.
posted by BungaDunga at 9:00 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
And, to riff on this a little, the highly personalized nature of TikTok means that it can be anything to everyone. "But aren't Americans all getting pro-Palestine info from it"- no, they aren't. You are because you're interested. There's probably Zionist TikTok that you're not seeing because the algorithm is just that good. Whether it actually tilts one way or another, or gives people unvarnished access to information, is basically impossible to say, because everyone sees a different TikTok.
This also means that members of Congress almost certainly have no idea that there's a bunch of pro-Palestinian content on there because they and their aides never see it. How would they know to worry about it? At most someone's nephew or grandchild might send them something. It's not like Twitter where there was a semi-national "conversation" that most pols and journos participated in. If they were really worried about Palestinian content there would have been Congressional hearings filled with allegations about "Hamas" and "terrorism," which I don't recall. This was a Congressional initiative and it's usually fairly clear what is on their minds.
posted by BungaDunga at 9:00 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
This is one of the hottest topics on Weibo right now, and this post/discussion about how Red Note might apply different censoring/recommendation rules to overseas users is interesting to read. (To certain extent Wechat already does that. Even in the same chat group, based on IP/registration info, some users' posts might be "shielded" from other users.) One comment calls that "Cyber Concession Zone" /赛博租界, which, based on Chinese's colonial history in the early 1900s, is brilliantly ironic.
Apparently a lot of native Red Note users are telling the incoming LGBTQ users that the platform is pretty friendly as long as "the content isn't too in-your face", which raises eyebrows of other native users who know better.
Still, it looks like a honeymoon period right now and it's nice to read about something other than the LA wildfire and rampant human trafficking in Myanmar/Thailand.
posted by of strange foe at 9:10 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Apparently a lot of native Red Note users are telling the incoming LGBTQ users that the platform is pretty friendly as long as "the content isn't too in-your face", which raises eyebrows of other native users who know better.
Still, it looks like a honeymoon period right now and it's nice to read about something other than the LA wildfire and rampant human trafficking in Myanmar/Thailand.
posted by of strange foe at 9:10 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
TikTok and pro-Palestinian content was such a major concern that they made a whole post addressing it back in Nov 2023 - laying out data at the time that showed, worldwide, that there was more support for Palestine than Israel. A bunch of Jewish celebrities at the time complained to TikTok directly. Mitt Romney linked the TikTok ban to pro-Palestinian content.
I'm not disputing that the TikTok ban was in the works prior to events of Oct 7, but the massive pro-Palestinian sentiment did seem to accelerate action on the parts of US legislators.
posted by toastyk at 9:12 AM on January 14 [19 favorites]
I'm not disputing that the TikTok ban was in the works prior to events of Oct 7, but the massive pro-Palestinian sentiment did seem to accelerate action on the parts of US legislators.
posted by toastyk at 9:12 AM on January 14 [19 favorites]
I'm decompressing after a big work deadline so I was on TikTok a LOT yesterday and this morning. I'm seeing the effects of people leaving the platform in real time. And this move to RedNote - left-leaning, neurodivergent intellectual TT has definitely shifted over there. Creators are saying that it's a good vibe and people are really nice to one another in the comments, which seems to me to the be biggest factor driving which platform this type of creator is choosing going forward. So yeah, the people looking for community and not monetization have clearly settled on RedNote.
My FYP is kind of a wasteland, and it's as if the algorithm doesn't even know what to feed me because the big American creators are gone. I've followed a whole bunch of new fellow Canadian creators. I'm grateful for the notable lack of celebrity gossip videos. I've also noticed that the bots/paid trolls are not in sight these past 24 hours (I'm Canadian, so I mean the ones that are mindlessly chant "PP for PM!"). So it's mostly Canadian content and greatest hits memes and smaller creators I'm seeing.
I'm hoping for my FPY to turn into something like a 'commonwealth' feed, but for Canada it's still prioritizing US content rather than UK, Australia, New Zealand.
posted by kitcat at 9:21 AM on January 14 [3 favorites]
My FYP is kind of a wasteland, and it's as if the algorithm doesn't even know what to feed me because the big American creators are gone. I've followed a whole bunch of new fellow Canadian creators. I'm grateful for the notable lack of celebrity gossip videos. I've also noticed that the bots/paid trolls are not in sight these past 24 hours (I'm Canadian, so I mean the ones that are mindlessly chant "PP for PM!"). So it's mostly Canadian content and greatest hits memes and smaller creators I'm seeing.
I'm hoping for my FPY to turn into something like a 'commonwealth' feed, but for Canada it's still prioritizing US content rather than UK, Australia, New Zealand.
posted by kitcat at 9:21 AM on January 14 [3 favorites]
Uh, I seem to have missed the US government propaganda campaign telling Americans that Chinese people are all living in poverty and eating expensive groceries. What?
Not sure if that's a correct reading of the statement and not what I got from the BlueSky thread at all. They are saying that there's been 30 years of US propaganda about how much life in China and living under their uniquely bad and oppressive government totally sucks, and now people are being exposed to a population that appears to be living fairly comparably normal lives and on top of that being provided some fairly nice things that we in the US sure as hell don't get to have and may never see in our lifetimes.
It's not that the Chinese government is good and awesome and it's utopia, it's that this country that the state department will insist is so censored and oppressed and incarcerated and anti-freedom and liberty and not like us is actually filled with young people on their own social media with their own shopping and fashion and streetwear and trends and memes and foodies who try new restaurants, and on top of that they get cheap food, free healthcare and high speed rail. Seeing another way of life on it's own, even under a flawed government, is enough to make anyone - especially young people who are addicted to social media - question all of the borderline cold war 2.0 trade warring bullshit.
posted by windbox at 9:24 AM on January 14 [34 favorites]
Not sure if that's a correct reading of the statement and not what I got from the BlueSky thread at all. They are saying that there's been 30 years of US propaganda about how much life in China and living under their uniquely bad and oppressive government totally sucks, and now people are being exposed to a population that appears to be living fairly comparably normal lives and on top of that being provided some fairly nice things that we in the US sure as hell don't get to have and may never see in our lifetimes.
It's not that the Chinese government is good and awesome and it's utopia, it's that this country that the state department will insist is so censored and oppressed and incarcerated and anti-freedom and liberty and not like us is actually filled with young people on their own social media with their own shopping and fashion and streetwear and trends and memes and foodies who try new restaurants, and on top of that they get cheap food, free healthcare and high speed rail. Seeing another way of life on it's own, even under a flawed government, is enough to make anyone - especially young people who are addicted to social media - question all of the borderline cold war 2.0 trade warring bullshit.
posted by windbox at 9:24 AM on January 14 [34 favorites]
> BungaDunga: "This also means that members of Congress almost certainly have no idea that there's a bunch of pro-Palestinian content on there because they and their aides never see it. How would they know to worry about it?"
Well, conservative politicians are constantly up in arms about things they've never seen (e.g.: litterboxes in classrooms). They get their information from conservative sources, so if any one of those sources takes up the issue, you'll have a wave of conservative politicians suddenly very worked up about it. I haven't kept up with conservative sources regarding pro-Palestine content to know for sure if it was one of their burning issues about TikTok.
From what I can tell, there are at least three general theories for why the US govt is so interested in banning TikTok:
posted by mhum at 9:36 AM on January 14 [8 favorites]
Well, conservative politicians are constantly up in arms about things they've never seen (e.g.: litterboxes in classrooms). They get their information from conservative sources, so if any one of those sources takes up the issue, you'll have a wave of conservative politicians suddenly very worked up about it. I haven't kept up with conservative sources regarding pro-Palestine content to know for sure if it was one of their burning issues about TikTok.
From what I can tell, there are at least three general theories for why the US govt is so interested in banning TikTok:
- Chinese govt having access to user data
- TikTok being too pro-Palestine (or other content-based reasons)
- Mark Zuckerberg
posted by mhum at 9:36 AM on January 14 [8 favorites]
windbox, that's also how I interpreted it. The US has been swimming in Sinophobia for as long as I've been alive (and longer) and I think it's cool that Gen Z is seeing that Chinese youth and similar aren't terribly different than them.
posted by Kitteh at 9:37 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
posted by Kitteh at 9:37 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
In other user exodus news:
Meta Is Blocking Links to Decentralized Instagram Competitor Pixelfed
Pixelfed said it is "seeing unprecedented levels of traffic."
posted by Kabanos at 9:42 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
Meta Is Blocking Links to Decentralized Instagram Competitor Pixelfed
Pixelfed said it is "seeing unprecedented levels of traffic."
posted by Kabanos at 9:42 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
I've just seen a video from from one of the TikTok 'journalists' giving an update on the possible 270 day extension for TT. Rather than being hopeful and eager to get to keep TikTok the top comments are all like this:
Can you make this in Madarin please? It's now my primary language
Too late: Rednote named me Little sweet potato and I've already made it my whole personality
People are desperate for a little levity.
posted by kitcat at 9:43 AM on January 14 [18 favorites]
Can you make this in Madarin please? It's now my primary language
Too late: Rednote named me Little sweet potato and I've already made it my whole personality
People are desperate for a little levity.
posted by kitcat at 9:43 AM on January 14 [18 favorites]
Ok, just want to report a new angle... some Weibo posters are warning Chinese RedNote users that they should be careful of random foreigners eager to chat privately, as they can be scammers pretending to TT refugees. (There's a term for such scams called 杀猪盘.)
People can never have nice things (for long).
P.S. something else funny: Elon Musk's mom is popular on RedNote, but the newcomers are getting the word out that she's 'bad bad bad people'. Maye Musk's account has since closed off its comment section.
posted by of strange foe at 10:21 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
People can never have nice things (for long).
P.S. something else funny: Elon Musk's mom is popular on RedNote, but the newcomers are getting the word out that she's 'bad bad bad people'. Maye Musk's account has since closed off its comment section.
posted by of strange foe at 10:21 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
actually filled with young people on their own social media with their own shopping and fashion and streetwear and trends and memes and foodies who try new restaurants, and on top of that they get cheap food, free healthcare and high speed rail
Are any of them Uyghurs?
posted by cooker girl at 10:30 AM on January 14 [20 favorites]
Are any of them Uyghurs?
posted by cooker girl at 10:30 AM on January 14 [20 favorites]
there's been 30 years of US propaganda about how much life in China and living under their uniquely bad and oppressive government totally sucks
Dumb question: where? Where are the blockbuster movies depicting the horrors of Xinjiang? Where's Jack Ryan coming up against the dastardly Chinese menace? America is pretty good at propaganda when we want to be.
posted by BungaDunga at 10:36 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Dumb question: where? Where are the blockbuster movies depicting the horrors of Xinjiang? Where's Jack Ryan coming up against the dastardly Chinese menace? America is pretty good at propaganda when we want to be.
posted by BungaDunga at 10:36 AM on January 14 [7 favorites]
I kind of figured this would come up by now, but since it hasn't: organized foreign TikTok influence campaigns from Russia and/or China during the first round of the Romanian presidential runoff led to a first place finish for Călin Georgescu, a bonkers-ass pro-Russian shill in the initial voting.
The EU investigated, found alarming levels of manipulation and chaos, including bot armies, millions in undeclared payments to influencers to promote the pro-Russian candidate, many/most ads from that campaign not being tagged as political campaigning (which is highly illegal in Romania), hashtag hijacking, and more.
The first round of voting was invalidated, but Georgescu may still win. This is because Romanians are so sick of their famously corrupt major parties that the intervention to toss aside the TikTok-influenced voting is being widely considered as simply an attempt by party elites to hold onto power. (The problem is, they're not wrong... it is definitely that, but it is also a legitimate attempt to toss out voting tainted by pro-Russian TikTok shenanigans.)
Unless Georgescu is barred from the new election, to be held in March, it looks like many Romanians may vote for him out of spite. And even if he's barred, the far-right has sensed their moment and AUR (the far-right party Georgescu was originally in before getting kicked out for being too extreme) has sensed their moment and may try to capitalize.
So yeah, TL;DR: TikTok more or less single-handedly fucked up Romania's presidential election. Even among a social media landscape where many/most of the major apps are vulnerable to influence campaigns and present the danger of election meddling, TikTok seems to be especially, particularly bad.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:38 AM on January 14 [18 favorites]
The EU investigated, found alarming levels of manipulation and chaos, including bot armies, millions in undeclared payments to influencers to promote the pro-Russian candidate, many/most ads from that campaign not being tagged as political campaigning (which is highly illegal in Romania), hashtag hijacking, and more.
The first round of voting was invalidated, but Georgescu may still win. This is because Romanians are so sick of their famously corrupt major parties that the intervention to toss aside the TikTok-influenced voting is being widely considered as simply an attempt by party elites to hold onto power. (The problem is, they're not wrong... it is definitely that, but it is also a legitimate attempt to toss out voting tainted by pro-Russian TikTok shenanigans.)
Unless Georgescu is barred from the new election, to be held in March, it looks like many Romanians may vote for him out of spite. And even if he's barred, the far-right has sensed their moment and AUR (the far-right party Georgescu was originally in before getting kicked out for being too extreme) has sensed their moment and may try to capitalize.
So yeah, TL;DR: TikTok more or less single-handedly fucked up Romania's presidential election. Even among a social media landscape where many/most of the major apps are vulnerable to influence campaigns and present the danger of election meddling, TikTok seems to be especially, particularly bad.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:38 AM on January 14 [18 favorites]
TikTok more or less single-handedly fucked up Romania's presidential election.
There are definitely bot armies in all of social media. Here in Canada, for instance, from what I see in my relatives who are only on FB, it's FB that's the foreign influence vehicle. Do we know that it's worse on TikTok?
posted by kitcat at 10:46 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
There are definitely bot armies in all of social media. Here in Canada, for instance, from what I see in my relatives who are only on FB, it's FB that's the foreign influence vehicle. Do we know that it's worse on TikTok?
posted by kitcat at 10:46 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
Yes, the EU investigation felt TikTok was much worse in this case.
In Romania, within the final ten days before the election, Georgescu was able to move from a candidate polling in the low single digits, so marginal he did not qualify to participate in any of the debates to the lading vote-getter and front runner.
In addition to the bot armies, there were millions in undeclared payments to influencers to promote Georgescu. On top of this many/most ads from that campaign managed to evade being tagged as political campaigning (evasion of which is highly illegal in Romania), there was hashtag hijacking, etc. It was a dense, sudden, multi-pronged attack that seemed to originate form one or two foreign sources.
Similar influence campaigns occurred in Moldova and Georgia, but with a population where roughly half of all adults use TikTok, media literacy is low, and skepticism of dominant political parties is rampant, Romania was an ideal situation for this kind of interference.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:49 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
In Romania, within the final ten days before the election, Georgescu was able to move from a candidate polling in the low single digits, so marginal he did not qualify to participate in any of the debates to the lading vote-getter and front runner.
In addition to the bot armies, there were millions in undeclared payments to influencers to promote Georgescu. On top of this many/most ads from that campaign managed to evade being tagged as political campaigning (evasion of which is highly illegal in Romania), there was hashtag hijacking, etc. It was a dense, sudden, multi-pronged attack that seemed to originate form one or two foreign sources.
Similar influence campaigns occurred in Moldova and Georgia, but with a population where roughly half of all adults use TikTok, media literacy is low, and skepticism of dominant political parties is rampant, Romania was an ideal situation for this kind of interference.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:49 AM on January 14 [12 favorites]
RE a VPN workaround for US TikTok. Aside from blocking the application from functioning in the US, the law is written to compel app store owners (Google, Apple, etc) to remove TikTok from their stores (NPR). So while the app may exist on your phone, it won't receive updates and will eventually break as it deviates from functioning versions, and new users wouldn't be able to find it to install it. You'd have to change your AppStore account to an international one to see it again, which requires an international billing address to access. The law also compels data storage companies (namely Oracle) to cease hosting TikTok's data in the US. Which will break all kinds of things. A VPN may solve some of that, but probably not for long.
posted by msbutah at 10:51 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
posted by msbutah at 10:51 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
Anybody looking for a TikTok alternative that isn't run by a corporation and isn't looking to steal your data (RedNote periodically reads your clipboard, btw) should check out Loops.video
It's still being developed and has a couple of growing pains but I hope people support it.
posted by signsofrain at 10:52 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
It's still being developed and has a couple of growing pains but I hope people support it.
posted by signsofrain at 10:52 AM on January 14 [4 favorites]
The Romanian TikTok influence campaign was so bonkers that when the first round of voting was invalidated and the investigations into who was behind it all started up, there was reportedly a rash of tearful Romanian influencers taking to their feeds to wish their friends and families goodbye as they fled the country to avoid prosecution.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:56 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:56 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
I'm seeing a lot of people across the internet jumping out of their chairs at the chance to call people stupid for the apparently horrible crime of looking for a place to find human connection and a few silly little videos to brighten their day, as though it's each person's sole responsibility to eschew all that in order to prevent any and all imperialist propaganda from ever entering their brain, as though that's possible, as though any of us have even met one person who wasn't brainwashed and addicted to some form of brainrot, if not something much darker. They sound like the people who like to point out when people at the food bank have their nails done. It's not TikTok users' faults that every viable platform is owned and/or controlled by some sort of powerful, evil entity.
People are desperate for a little levity.
Exactly.
posted by lampoil at 10:59 AM on January 14 [25 favorites]
People are desperate for a little levity.
Exactly.
posted by lampoil at 10:59 AM on January 14 [25 favorites]
Dumb question: where? Where are the blockbuster movies depicting the horrors of Xinjiang? Where's Jack Ryan coming up against the dastardly Chinese menace? America is pretty good at propaganda when we want to be.
Studios won't make those because China is a huge market.
posted by warriorqueen at 11:00 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
Studios won't make those because China is a huge market.
posted by warriorqueen at 11:00 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
Deputy Editor at Foreign Policy debunking the claim that China has "high quality" groceries - lol I'm sorry, but the idea that Chinese groceries are "high quality" is fucking hilarious. China has a famously bad food storage chain and the Chinese press and public are full of constant complaints! Food poisoning/diarrhea are so common that they're a regular work excuse.
posted by toastyk at 11:17 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
posted by toastyk at 11:17 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
encouraging a bunch of Chinese influencers to talk up the Chinese system to Americans flooding RedNote would probably be the cheapest influence campaign ever run, if not for the whole TikTok ban probably being quite expensive
posted by BungaDunga at 11:25 AM on January 14 [1 favorite]
posted by BungaDunga at 11:25 AM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Deleted Insta off my phone after 2016. Was shocked when nobody else did. At this point I'm pretty checked out about the whole thing. Wouldn't it be better if we all just went back to hanging out in coffeeshops, being silly and bored in person?
Seriously, though. Part of the reason I came back here after almost two decades or whatever is because I'm increasingly of the opinion that Web 3.0 and everything since then is just inherently toxic and oriented towards the power and control of megalomaniac assholes. Even reddit sucks now.
posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 11:31 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
Seriously, though. Part of the reason I came back here after almost two decades or whatever is because I'm increasingly of the opinion that Web 3.0 and everything since then is just inherently toxic and oriented towards the power and control of megalomaniac assholes. Even reddit sucks now.
posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 11:31 AM on January 14 [11 favorites]
The shortest way I can explain how bad the Romania situation went is this: imagine if starting a week or so before Halloween, TikTok managed to hype RFK Jr. up into winning the US presidential election.
It's not a perfect analogy in any way, and thankfully, the Romanians use a runoff/multi-round system.
But on this one point, the hypothetical/analogy holds: in less time than it takes a carton of milk to go off, a highly marginal candidate, generally accepted as out-of-his-goddamned-mind, went from footnote to frontrunner, it all happened via TikTok, and it was all directed by under-the-table payments and large scale automated algorithm fuckery.
It was freaking terrifying.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:32 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
It's not a perfect analogy in any way, and thankfully, the Romanians use a runoff/multi-round system.
But on this one point, the hypothetical/analogy holds: in less time than it takes a carton of milk to go off, a highly marginal candidate, generally accepted as out-of-his-goddamned-mind, went from footnote to frontrunner, it all happened via TikTok, and it was all directed by under-the-table payments and large scale automated algorithm fuckery.
It was freaking terrifying.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:32 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
Ever since the Cambridge Analytica scandal I have thought there should be a 1 month geo-block shutdown of all social media before an election. They have shown themselves unable or unwilling to be impartial. A one month cleanse every 5 years doesn't seem too bad if it prevents a slide into fascism.
posted by Lanark at 11:32 AM on January 14 [16 favorites]
posted by Lanark at 11:32 AM on January 14 [16 favorites]
But on this one point, the hypothetical/analogy holds: in less time than it takes a carton of milk to go off, a highly marginal candidate, generally accepted as out-of-his-goddamned-mind, went from footnote to frontrunner, it all happened via TikTok, and it was all directed by under-the-table payments and large scale automated algorithm fuckery.
It was freaking terrifying.
Didnt this turn out to be an own goal? like how Hillary Clinton paid for pro trump ads during the GOP primary because they thought he would be a weaker candidate.
posted by Iax at 11:39 AM on January 14 [3 favorites]
There's such an easy solution to all this that's not xenophobic or tied up in a stupid escalation with the one other world power (China). Create and enforce strict data privacy and social media rules that apply to all platforms. If the economy has to take a onetime hit, I'd rather it be "the for-profit internet collapses because tracking data is outlawed" than a full-on mortgage crises or a pandemic. Let's rip the band-aid off. People whose livelihoods depend on influencing and such will have problems, but frankly it was a gold rush situation; no one can credibly claim their whole raison d'etre and career would be wiped out because these platforms have only existed for a few years and everyone knew all along that they were corporate and would disappear or be replaced over time anyway.
Q: What does a Gen Xer say to an adult child who makes $1 million a year on streaming and social platforms?
A: It's still not a real job!
posted by caviar2d2 at 11:43 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
Q: What does a Gen Xer say to an adult child who makes $1 million a year on streaming and social platforms?
A: It's still not a real job!
posted by caviar2d2 at 11:43 AM on January 14 [10 favorites]
Didnt this turn out to be an own goal?
Nah.
At one point, there were reports that one of the three leading parties had promoted Georgescu assuming it would weaken their rivals. What actually turns out to have happened is that they paid to promote a hashtag, but did not realize when the tag was hijacked by Georgescu's team.
As said above though, this was a multi-prong attack. Influencers were paid through third parties (with funds originating from other countries) to promote Georgescu's videos. Various tricks were used to help the candidate's own videos (and thus, replies/reposts) avoid "political content" tags. Bot armies were used to astroturf trending status.
On top of that, the actual content of Georgescu's video's was modelled very closely after modern Russian propaganda. A person could call that a coincidence, but once you have millions of Euros appearing out of nowhere to promote the one pro-Russian candidate, that becomes a pretty weak argument.
Plus, very nearly the same thing happened immediately before in Moldova and Georgia, in each case boosting pro-Russian candidates.
The one main thing the EU investigation couldn't settle on is whether this was purely Russian doing or if they had help from their Chinese allies.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:51 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Nah.
At one point, there were reports that one of the three leading parties had promoted Georgescu assuming it would weaken their rivals. What actually turns out to have happened is that they paid to promote a hashtag, but did not realize when the tag was hijacked by Georgescu's team.
As said above though, this was a multi-prong attack. Influencers were paid through third parties (with funds originating from other countries) to promote Georgescu's videos. Various tricks were used to help the candidate's own videos (and thus, replies/reposts) avoid "political content" tags. Bot armies were used to astroturf trending status.
On top of that, the actual content of Georgescu's video's was modelled very closely after modern Russian propaganda. A person could call that a coincidence, but once you have millions of Euros appearing out of nowhere to promote the one pro-Russian candidate, that becomes a pretty weak argument.
Plus, very nearly the same thing happened immediately before in Moldova and Georgia, in each case boosting pro-Russian candidates.
The one main thing the EU investigation couldn't settle on is whether this was purely Russian doing or if they had help from their Chinese allies.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:51 AM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Translation (with google help) of a Weibo user's observation on the whole thing:
I saw a note on Xiaohongshu (RedNote) about US troops stationed in South Korea saying they were exhausted. A "cat tax" payment post is followed by a discussion about why people all over the world keep tabby cats. Chinese people help Americans with math tests, and Americans help Chinese with English fill-in-the-blanks assignments. Americans say we were not well educated, so our answers might be wrong. American southerners say our English is looked down upon in exams, and Chinese southerners say the same thing applies to them in their country. The comment section of an Arizona redneck showing off the big fish he caught is totally typical of Xiaohongshu, with a bunch of people showing off their bigger catches. Disco Elysium fans ask for like-minded people to post photos of meetups in their city in China in the comment section, and found visions of their heaven. Black musicians play music and sing and explain their craft. Chinese people ask Americans if they have to work two jobs to make a living, and more than a thousand replies talk about how hard they work. Foreign fangirls bring new "food" to European and American fandom circles. Natives post popular science videos, and the hottest topics in the comment section are what do you eat? Is it delicious? Is it expensive for tourists to eat there? People in northern India discuss with Chinese language researchers, asking whether they are in the Tibeto-Burman language zone and exchanging phonetic comparison tables. I also saw cows on a farm 15 minutes away from me by car, as well as cows, horses, and donkeys in various states. American female miners go down the mines, female scientists do experiments. Chinese bird watchers want to see rare foreign birds, and there are thousands of photos of rare birds in the comment area.
It seems that I fast-forwarded directly from chat rooms/ icq / msnspace to this moment, and everything that happened in between was a dream.
posted by of strange foe at 12:02 PM on January 14 [28 favorites]
I saw a note on Xiaohongshu (RedNote) about US troops stationed in South Korea saying they were exhausted. A "cat tax" payment post is followed by a discussion about why people all over the world keep tabby cats. Chinese people help Americans with math tests, and Americans help Chinese with English fill-in-the-blanks assignments. Americans say we were not well educated, so our answers might be wrong. American southerners say our English is looked down upon in exams, and Chinese southerners say the same thing applies to them in their country. The comment section of an Arizona redneck showing off the big fish he caught is totally typical of Xiaohongshu, with a bunch of people showing off their bigger catches. Disco Elysium fans ask for like-minded people to post photos of meetups in their city in China in the comment section, and found visions of their heaven. Black musicians play music and sing and explain their craft. Chinese people ask Americans if they have to work two jobs to make a living, and more than a thousand replies talk about how hard they work. Foreign fangirls bring new "food" to European and American fandom circles. Natives post popular science videos, and the hottest topics in the comment section are what do you eat? Is it delicious? Is it expensive for tourists to eat there? People in northern India discuss with Chinese language researchers, asking whether they are in the Tibeto-Burman language zone and exchanging phonetic comparison tables. I also saw cows on a farm 15 minutes away from me by car, as well as cows, horses, and donkeys in various states. American female miners go down the mines, female scientists do experiments. Chinese bird watchers want to see rare foreign birds, and there are thousands of photos of rare birds in the comment area.
It seems that I fast-forwarded directly from chat rooms/ icq / msnspace to this moment, and everything that happened in between was a dream.
posted by of strange foe at 12:02 PM on January 14 [28 favorites]
> caviar2d2: "There's such an easy solution to all this that's not xenophobic or tied up in a stupid escalation with the one other world power (China). Create and enforce strict data privacy and social media rules that apply to all platforms."
If I'm interpreting this correctly, it seems to me that this idea operates under the theory that the US govt's concerns about data security/privacy vis-a-vis the Chinese govt are, in fact, genuine and the prime motivation for the ban. Tbh, I'm not exactly sure why we should accept the US govt's story here at face value. It seems just as (if not more) likely to me that the US govt's motivations here are less about protecting US users from nefarious (and unspecified) data stuff from China and more about, well, simple protectionism. For example, I imagine the US govt would not be super stoked if some Chinese company were about to buy NBC or CNN and would move to block that acquisition. And as far as I can tell, TikTok's US audience is far larger than CNN's, although it's probably not quite kosher to compare their respective audiences like that.
posted by mhum at 12:09 PM on January 14 [4 favorites]
If I'm interpreting this correctly, it seems to me that this idea operates under the theory that the US govt's concerns about data security/privacy vis-a-vis the Chinese govt are, in fact, genuine and the prime motivation for the ban. Tbh, I'm not exactly sure why we should accept the US govt's story here at face value. It seems just as (if not more) likely to me that the US govt's motivations here are less about protecting US users from nefarious (and unspecified) data stuff from China and more about, well, simple protectionism. For example, I imagine the US govt would not be super stoked if some Chinese company were about to buy NBC or CNN and would move to block that acquisition. And as far as I can tell, TikTok's US audience is far larger than CNN's, although it's probably not quite kosher to compare their respective audiences like that.
posted by mhum at 12:09 PM on January 14 [4 favorites]
I'd like some more corroboration that this is "a thing"
I've witnessed dozens of US high school students download it today. Maybe over 40, I lost count. I know this is also only anedata, but that last article about TT refugees (eyeroll) and memes spread really quickly.
posted by Snowishberlin at 12:15 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
I've witnessed dozens of US high school students download it today. Maybe over 40, I lost count. I know this is also only anedata, but that last article about TT refugees (eyeroll) and memes spread really quickly.
posted by Snowishberlin at 12:15 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Not much to add here, beyond a couple questions:
Is Bluesky a less horrid social media application than, well, all the rest? And can we just kill all social media, and turn all regular media into non profit public benefit corporations?
Oh yea, bonus question, which is worse, AI or Social Media? (JK, sort of).
posted by WatTylerJr at 12:23 PM on January 14 [2 favorites]
Is Bluesky a less horrid social media application than, well, all the rest? And can we just kill all social media, and turn all regular media into non profit public benefit corporations?
Oh yea, bonus question, which is worse, AI or Social Media? (JK, sort of).
posted by WatTylerJr at 12:23 PM on January 14 [2 favorites]
It seems just as (if not more) likely to me that the US govt's motivations here are less about protecting US users from nefarious (and unspecified) data stuff from China and more about, well, simple protectionism.
Oh, you're totally correct. The whole TikTok thing is 90% bullshit. I'm just saying that if the US could ever be arsed to have just leaders who aren't in thrall to their masters, most of the issues we have around social media/privacy/etc. etc. are easily solvable. The ideas are simple if you don't care whether Google folds; you really just tell the American people your goal is to un-entwine us from the huge companies' influence in a gradual and thoughtful way that gives us a soft landing and puts us in a better place as a people. It won't happen though :-(
posted by caviar2d2 at 12:29 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Oh, you're totally correct. The whole TikTok thing is 90% bullshit. I'm just saying that if the US could ever be arsed to have just leaders who aren't in thrall to their masters, most of the issues we have around social media/privacy/etc. etc. are easily solvable. The ideas are simple if you don't care whether Google folds; you really just tell the American people your goal is to un-entwine us from the huge companies' influence in a gradual and thoughtful way that gives us a soft landing and puts us in a better place as a people. It won't happen though :-(
posted by caviar2d2 at 12:29 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
Duh, Canadian TikTok is called "TickToque."
posted by wenestvedt at 12:49 PM on January 14 [15 favorites]
posted by wenestvedt at 12:49 PM on January 14 [15 favorites]
Aside from spite (which is a totally reasonable explanation in my book), is there any reason to move to rednote from TikTok? Does it fill the same niche? Or is it simply a matter of "you took away my Chinese app so I'm going to adopt another Chinese app"?
posted by Reverend John at 1:22 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
posted by Reverend John at 1:22 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
>is there any reason to move to rednote from TikTok? Does it fill the same niche?
It has similar features and user experience (video first, infinite swipe, an algorithm that tunes to your preferences quickly, optional 2x acceleration for any video with a touch).
There is extreme disdain on TikTok for Instagram Reels and a sort of exhausted wariness of things like YouTube Shorts. I don't use Instagram but I can definitely say YT Shorts may have a preference algorithm but it's both tone deaf and insistent on jackhammering in higher monetizing content (or just trending toward garbage) after twenty or so swipes.
posted by Lenie Clarke at 1:49 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
It has similar features and user experience (video first, infinite swipe, an algorithm that tunes to your preferences quickly, optional 2x acceleration for any video with a touch).
There is extreme disdain on TikTok for Instagram Reels and a sort of exhausted wariness of things like YouTube Shorts. I don't use Instagram but I can definitely say YT Shorts may have a preference algorithm but it's both tone deaf and insistent on jackhammering in higher monetizing content (or just trending toward garbage) after twenty or so swipes.
posted by Lenie Clarke at 1:49 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
Do you mean - why move to RedNote instead of one of the other platforms? People seem to be delighted by the spite of it all, but I don't think it's the main reason.
I don't use any of the other platforms (except FB for occasional city/neighbourhood stuff). The best I can glean from what I am hearing from the side of TikTok I'm on is that everyone despises X and FaceBook for the same reasons they are despised here. YouTube is for serious, niche creators who are going to switch to longform content. And Instagram is too 'mean' or 'they don't understand my jokes' or 'the discourse here is 7 years behind what it was on TT'. And lastly, because a few key people apparently did it and now everyone is following suit.
posted by kitcat at 1:52 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
I don't use any of the other platforms (except FB for occasional city/neighbourhood stuff). The best I can glean from what I am hearing from the side of TikTok I'm on is that everyone despises X and FaceBook for the same reasons they are despised here. YouTube is for serious, niche creators who are going to switch to longform content. And Instagram is too 'mean' or 'they don't understand my jokes' or 'the discourse here is 7 years behind what it was on TT'. And lastly, because a few key people apparently did it and now everyone is following suit.
posted by kitcat at 1:52 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Isn't the fact that, days before a potential tiktok shutdown, a different but coincidentally-also-PRC-controlled app that previously no one had heard of is massively trending on tiktok, itself a good reason to be suspicious of tiktok?
posted by kickingtheground at 1:57 PM on January 14 [9 favorites]
posted by kickingtheground at 1:57 PM on January 14 [9 favorites]
It's not a reason to be more suspicious of TikTok more than any other platform. We are all to varying degrees susceptible to manipulation and there are manipulators everywhere.
posted by kitcat at 2:04 PM on January 14 [2 favorites]
posted by kitcat at 2:04 PM on January 14 [2 favorites]
The Guardian quotes an (unnamed) source saying more than 700K have joined in the last two days.
posted by grandiloquiet at 2:16 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
posted by grandiloquiet at 2:16 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
I think one of the reasons folks are choosing 小红书 over Insta or Youtube shorts is the perception that certain American billionaires who own social media companies pressured the US gov into the TikTok ban with the hope that they would pick up ex-TikTok users, so not giving those bros what they want is another layer of spite.
Anyway this is all hilarious and honestly heartwarming. There is a ton of really sweet cultural exchange happening in the comments, and lots of Americans commenting on Chinese food and travel posts being like omg how did I not know about this? And then folks from TikTok posting NativeTok dance videos, and Chinese users saying it's their first time seeing that culture. US users are using Google Translate to post their comments in both Chinese and English, so there are actual convos happening. And Chinese users demanding the Americans pay cat tax.
On a more serious note it takes a sustained effort to get a population ready to accept a war, and I always have the vague dread that the intense anti-China bias in US media is exactly for this purpose. Imagine if all those efforts get blown away by a troll protest against the ham-handed effort to ban TT. Even if it only lasts a short time, these few weeks of cultural exchange will definitely have an impact on American users.
posted by catcafe at 2:26 PM on January 14 [14 favorites]
Anyway this is all hilarious and honestly heartwarming. There is a ton of really sweet cultural exchange happening in the comments, and lots of Americans commenting on Chinese food and travel posts being like omg how did I not know about this? And then folks from TikTok posting NativeTok dance videos, and Chinese users saying it's their first time seeing that culture. US users are using Google Translate to post their comments in both Chinese and English, so there are actual convos happening. And Chinese users demanding the Americans pay cat tax.
On a more serious note it takes a sustained effort to get a population ready to accept a war, and I always have the vague dread that the intense anti-China bias in US media is exactly for this purpose. Imagine if all those efforts get blown away by a troll protest against the ham-handed effort to ban TT. Even if it only lasts a short time, these few weeks of cultural exchange will definitely have an impact on American users.
posted by catcafe at 2:26 PM on January 14 [14 favorites]
> kickingtheground: "Isn't the fact that, days before a potential tiktok shutdown, a different but coincidentally-also-PRC-controlled app that previously no one had heard of is massively trending on tiktok, itself a good reason to be suspicious of tiktok?"
It could be so if you believe that the push towards Rednote is driven primarily by TikTok itself or some other Chinese-aligned entity (up to and including the PRC itself). On the other hand, if it's primarily an organic movement among US users towards an app that they believe is most analogous to TikTok, then TikTok's role here would be, at best, amplifying an existing trend. Of course, the way that TikTok works, even if this were the case, it wouldn't be necessarily clear if the company was doing it deliberately (e.g.: manually promoting pro-Rednote stuff) or if it was simply a function of how its own algorithm works (e.g.: lots of people are seeing pro-Rednote stuff because people in similar clusters are engaging positively with it).
posted by mhum at 2:55 PM on January 14 [3 favorites]
It could be so if you believe that the push towards Rednote is driven primarily by TikTok itself or some other Chinese-aligned entity (up to and including the PRC itself). On the other hand, if it's primarily an organic movement among US users towards an app that they believe is most analogous to TikTok, then TikTok's role here would be, at best, amplifying an existing trend. Of course, the way that TikTok works, even if this were the case, it wouldn't be necessarily clear if the company was doing it deliberately (e.g.: manually promoting pro-Rednote stuff) or if it was simply a function of how its own algorithm works (e.g.: lots of people are seeing pro-Rednote stuff because people in similar clusters are engaging positively with it).
posted by mhum at 2:55 PM on January 14 [3 favorites]
Getting and using a VPN is way beyond the technical capabilities of most people, I think.
Florida begs to differ.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 2:57 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Florida begs to differ.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 2:57 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Ctrl-F 'Taiwan'
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:04 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 3:04 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
Per my coworker who joined RedNote, it's full of Luigi fans, Chinese students bragging that they got RealID's, and Chinese military videos.
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:18 PM on January 14 [3 favorites]
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:18 PM on January 14 [3 favorites]
I mean it’s like TokTok, it shows you what you engage with. Mine is all lesbians, cats and food videos.
posted by catcafe at 3:35 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
posted by catcafe at 3:35 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
Weird, mine is all full of John Malkovich and Bill Murray.
posted by Reverend John at 3:42 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
posted by Reverend John at 3:42 PM on January 14 [1 favorite]
Imagine being a Threads or YouTube shorts product owner and realizing that people would rather use a product in a different language than ever use your app.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 3:43 PM on January 14 [16 favorites]
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 3:43 PM on January 14 [16 favorites]
Although we all "knew" it worked like this, there was a great first person account of Tiktok 's algorithm and its effect of feeding users exactly what they want to see - even on the same video and comments.
One poster shared a video where a woman complained about her boyfriend missing plans because he was out golfing and didn't let her know he'd be late. The poster's comments were all people condemning him and suggestions she dump him. Curious, the poster asked her boyfriend to look at the comments on the same video and he saw only comments condemning the woman for being over involved and defending the boyfriend.
Only seeing posts that confirm biases is one thing, only seeing others' comments that align with your existing biases on the same media seems especially dystopian.
(I haven't tested whether YouTube does the same thing because that would involve reading the comments)
posted by Lenie Clarke at 3:50 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
One poster shared a video where a woman complained about her boyfriend missing plans because he was out golfing and didn't let her know he'd be late. The poster's comments were all people condemning him and suggestions she dump him. Curious, the poster asked her boyfriend to look at the comments on the same video and he saw only comments condemning the woman for being over involved and defending the boyfriend.
Only seeing posts that confirm biases is one thing, only seeing others' comments that align with your existing biases on the same media seems especially dystopian.
(I haven't tested whether YouTube does the same thing because that would involve reading the comments)
posted by Lenie Clarke at 3:50 PM on January 14 [6 favorites]
On the topic of SM apps causing problems in other countries, we would be seriously remiss if FB and the Myanmar massacre wasn't included.
posted by nofundy at 5:34 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
posted by nofundy at 5:34 PM on January 14 [5 favorites]
As a long time Tiktok user who just started using Rednote I think spite got a lot of people to make the initial effort but Rednote is actually serving up content that isn't as easy to find on Tiktok and has a few real advantages.
Pluses:
Being able to use images in replies is huge.
The existing Chinese user base is mostly female and deeply brain rotted in a good way.
A ton of new memes.
Chinese lifestyle videos about cooking and fashion and home decoration are more polished and have better production values than western stuff.
No ads.
Negatives:
It seems to be harder to find queer content outside wlw videos which are thriving. Trans people are less visible.
There isn't an automatic translation feature yet. If you have a samsung phone you can hold down the menu button and hit translate to translate a screenshot of the whole screen but it is still annoying.
On the whole I still prefer Tiktok but I'll keep using Rednote. I'd much prefer to give my data to the Chinese government than to Zuckerberg or Musk.
posted by zymil at 6:12 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Pluses:
Being able to use images in replies is huge.
The existing Chinese user base is mostly female and deeply brain rotted in a good way.
A ton of new memes.
Chinese lifestyle videos about cooking and fashion and home decoration are more polished and have better production values than western stuff.
No ads.
Negatives:
It seems to be harder to find queer content outside wlw videos which are thriving. Trans people are less visible.
There isn't an automatic translation feature yet. If you have a samsung phone you can hold down the menu button and hit translate to translate a screenshot of the whole screen but it is still annoying.
On the whole I still prefer Tiktok but I'll keep using Rednote. I'd much prefer to give my data to the Chinese government than to Zuckerberg or Musk.
posted by zymil at 6:12 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Ctrl-F 'Taiwan'
This is one of those stories that will be less "fun" in retrospect.
posted by betweenthebars at 6:21 PM on January 14 [4 favorites]
This is one of those stories that will be less "fun" in retrospect.
posted by betweenthebars at 6:21 PM on January 14 [4 favorites]
I've been thinking about this for a fair while, and my view is that the questions of 'who gets the data' are not the key ones. Data is instrumental, in that it's only as valuable as the use it's put to; on facebook and instagram it's used primarily to drive advertising, and secondarily for bad agents to game algorithms and push propaganda, and those who say that in that context it's irrelevant whether it's American or Chinese corporations who own it are right. But! The United States and China remain fundamentally different societies in real ways, which have different attitudes towards what media is. In the USA as in other free societies, the media including social media is in a conversation with the State (protected there, I'd emphasise, by the US constitution's First Amendment, which remains real and powerful). In China and authoritarian societies like Russia, the State is in a conversation with itself and it is the media's job to reflect it. China has a fundamentally different attitude toward the use of its social media, as in the old Soviet joke; 'in the USSR I'm just as free as you, to stand in Red Square and call the US President a jerk!'
Content is also instrumental, and it's valuable from the bottom-up, for the users of services like these in ways American corporations will never really fully be able to control. For best instance, in the northern hemisphere summer of 2020, all of these social media networks were conduits for consciousness-raising and activism arising from George Floyd's death. It is fundamentally inconceivable that a network based in China could host anything remotely similarly challenging to the Chinese government or its policies. You cannot post a picture of Pooh Bear on wechat.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 7:13 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Content is also instrumental, and it's valuable from the bottom-up, for the users of services like these in ways American corporations will never really fully be able to control. For best instance, in the northern hemisphere summer of 2020, all of these social media networks were conduits for consciousness-raising and activism arising from George Floyd's death. It is fundamentally inconceivable that a network based in China could host anything remotely similarly challenging to the Chinese government or its policies. You cannot post a picture of Pooh Bear on wechat.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 7:13 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
I mean it’s like TokTok, it shows you what you engage with. Mine is all lesbians, cats and food videos (emphasis mine)
Right. I'd like to hear someone explain what is uniquely nefarious about TikTok. For foreign interference and propaganda to be spread on social media, one need only find or manufacture (by paying them) a few content creators to promote the idea, pay for a bot army to engage to upvote and comment, and the rest happens organically. It's trivially easy on any platform. There is no need for the platform itself to actively facilitate the campaign. I not saying these platforms don't actively facilitate. But TikTok wouldn't be successful it were constantly feeding people content they didn't agree with and didn't want to see.
People can be and have to be more savvy. I can often tell when a video has some kind of backing to push a particular narrative and I'm always on the lookout. I'm sure TikTok does boost undisclosed paid content - sometimes I see a right-wing Canadian video that I suspect is backed by Pierre Poilievre, Stephen Harper and the evangelists, for example. Or lately I see stuff trying to smear Blake Lively (akin to the Johnny Depp/Amber Heard campaign). I scroll past it and it stops. Whether I engage is up to me.
You will not be able to convince me that X, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram are not doing the same thing.
posted by kitcat at 7:18 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Right. I'd like to hear someone explain what is uniquely nefarious about TikTok. For foreign interference and propaganda to be spread on social media, one need only find or manufacture (by paying them) a few content creators to promote the idea, pay for a bot army to engage to upvote and comment, and the rest happens organically. It's trivially easy on any platform. There is no need for the platform itself to actively facilitate the campaign. I not saying these platforms don't actively facilitate. But TikTok wouldn't be successful it were constantly feeding people content they didn't agree with and didn't want to see.
People can be and have to be more savvy. I can often tell when a video has some kind of backing to push a particular narrative and I'm always on the lookout. I'm sure TikTok does boost undisclosed paid content - sometimes I see a right-wing Canadian video that I suspect is backed by Pierre Poilievre, Stephen Harper and the evangelists, for example. Or lately I see stuff trying to smear Blake Lively (akin to the Johnny Depp/Amber Heard campaign). I scroll past it and it stops. Whether I engage is up to me.
You will not be able to convince me that X, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram are not doing the same thing.
posted by kitcat at 7:18 PM on January 14 [7 favorites]
Where's Jack Ryan coming up against the dastardly Chinese menace?
BungaDunga that would be Debt of Honour through Commander in Chief, but most in-your-face in The Bear and the Dragon. The chronology is a little fucky, but after 1991 Jack Ryan is mainly facing off against Chinese or Iranian/Iraqi (I know they're not the same thing, but in Executive Orders they kind of are, it's a whole thing) or other Arab 'baddies'. I'm partway through my every-five-years reread.
Oh you don't want to read a thousand pages. Yeah no I don't know why there aren't any recent movies with dastardly Chinese menaces.
posted by ngaiotonga at 3:15 AM on January 15 [2 favorites]
BungaDunga that would be Debt of Honour through Commander in Chief, but most in-your-face in The Bear and the Dragon. The chronology is a little fucky, but after 1991 Jack Ryan is mainly facing off against Chinese or Iranian/Iraqi (I know they're not the same thing, but in Executive Orders they kind of are, it's a whole thing) or other Arab 'baddies'. I'm partway through my every-five-years reread.
Oh you don't want to read a thousand pages. Yeah no I don't know why there aren't any recent movies with dastardly Chinese menaces.
posted by ngaiotonga at 3:15 AM on January 15 [2 favorites]
Yeah no I don't know why there aren't any recent movies with dastardly Chinese menaces.
Sometimes they make them and then hastily change them to North Korean menaces in post.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 4:52 AM on January 15 [3 favorites]
Sometimes they make them and then hastily change them to North Korean menaces in post.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 4:52 AM on January 15 [3 favorites]
XHS-related takes from white people who can't read Mandarin and found out about the app two days ago (such as that woman on Bluesky claiming Chinese people eat lobster for lunch every day, lol??) should be understood not as any sort of meaningful commentary on China, but as commentary on America. Textbook Orientalism: the other as the mirror for the self. Idealization as the flip side of demonization.
Chinese people are people? Oh damn, no way, who could have guessed?
P.S. China very much does NOT have universal healthcare, this is a particular bit of misinformation that Americans love to spread (because of how shit their own healthcare system is). Basic services are relatively inexpensive, but specialty services get expensive, like, "potentially plunging your family into poverty" expensive, really quick. You can be turned away from the ER if you can't demonstrate your ability to pay, and having a family who will loudly and aggressively advocate for you (with 🧧 if necessary) can be the difference between life and death. Chinese healthcare is also tied to the hukou system, another thing that people who romanticize China tend to know very little about (because it will never affect them even if they move to China and live there as a foreigner).
P.P.S. None of this is to say "American healthcare is better" or something asinine like that, because the whole point is that Americans are not the main characters of the world! Other places have problems grounded in their own social contexts and history, and deserve to be understood on their own merits. Not just as an exercise for thinking about "How does this information relate to me, an American, the center of the universe?"
posted by cultanthropologist at 6:13 AM on January 15 [18 favorites]
Chinese people are people? Oh damn, no way, who could have guessed?
P.S. China very much does NOT have universal healthcare, this is a particular bit of misinformation that Americans love to spread (because of how shit their own healthcare system is). Basic services are relatively inexpensive, but specialty services get expensive, like, "potentially plunging your family into poverty" expensive, really quick. You can be turned away from the ER if you can't demonstrate your ability to pay, and having a family who will loudly and aggressively advocate for you (with 🧧 if necessary) can be the difference between life and death. Chinese healthcare is also tied to the hukou system, another thing that people who romanticize China tend to know very little about (because it will never affect them even if they move to China and live there as a foreigner).
P.P.S. None of this is to say "American healthcare is better" or something asinine like that, because the whole point is that Americans are not the main characters of the world! Other places have problems grounded in their own social contexts and history, and deserve to be understood on their own merits. Not just as an exercise for thinking about "How does this information relate to me, an American, the center of the universe?"
posted by cultanthropologist at 6:13 AM on January 15 [18 favorites]
Here's the RestofWorld story on it - American TikTokers did not seem to know, or care, about these rules. Their posts on Xiaohongshu range from seeking opinions on the Ukraine war to homosexuality to the Chinese government — topics that often trigger censorship in China. In the comments, some Chinese users reminded the newcomers not to discuss “politics, religion, and drugs.”
But not all Chinese users are thrilled. Lin, a 28-year-old Xiaohongshu user in China, found it “refreshing” to chat with American users at first, but soon grew tired of language and cultural barriers that led to stilted conversations, she told Rest of World.
“Xiaohongshu by nature is a Chinese-speaking community … It is kind of like a Chinese cultural circle that is hard to have foreigners mingled in,” said Lin, who only gave her last name over fears of repercussions from speaking to foreign media.
And Courtney Milan responding to the topic of self-censorship in an app under a different government - I have a different view on this: if I were talking to my family in China, I’m not going to mention those things, either, because, and this is important, I DO NOT WANT TO GET THEM IN TROUBLE.
posted by toastyk at 7:10 AM on January 15 [10 favorites]
But not all Chinese users are thrilled. Lin, a 28-year-old Xiaohongshu user in China, found it “refreshing” to chat with American users at first, but soon grew tired of language and cultural barriers that led to stilted conversations, she told Rest of World.
“Xiaohongshu by nature is a Chinese-speaking community … It is kind of like a Chinese cultural circle that is hard to have foreigners mingled in,” said Lin, who only gave her last name over fears of repercussions from speaking to foreign media.
And Courtney Milan responding to the topic of self-censorship in an app under a different government - I have a different view on this: if I were talking to my family in China, I’m not going to mention those things, either, because, and this is important, I DO NOT WANT TO GET THEM IN TROUBLE.
posted by toastyk at 7:10 AM on January 15 [10 favorites]
Yet another Weibo update... the post I translated got a lot more reads overnight, and there's one particular comment that I love:
Although everyone knows that the Tower of Babel will eventually fall, at this moment, please let us enjoy the interlude while the gods doze off, and let people once again embrace the dream of A world in Harmony.
虽然人人都心知肚明会走向巴别塔倒下的结局,但是,此时此刻还是请尽情享受一下诸神打盹间隙让人们再次拥抱住的世界大同美梦吧
On the light-hearted side, there are reports of Chinese users "helping" newcomers create their user names in Chinese. One means "helping old ladies jaywalk" and another innocuous looking one sounds the same as "rat poison".
Since there's no social taboo about discussing each other's salary, Chinese users are also asking these refugees how much they earn/what are their healthcare and education expenses etc, and getting quite an earful. Foreign users meanwhile are learning more about how ordinary Chinese people live from themselves. Someone came up with the cute term "对账/reconciling accounts" to describe such direct communications.
This post from a long-time Chinese user living abroad expresses some resentment towards the newcomers, she thinks the welcome they have received is indicative of their racial/language privileges. But the post still ended on a positive note -- it's good to see chinks in the wall letting light in on both sides, however fleetingly.
posted by of strange foe at 8:55 AM on January 15 [6 favorites]
Although everyone knows that the Tower of Babel will eventually fall, at this moment, please let us enjoy the interlude while the gods doze off, and let people once again embrace the dream of A world in Harmony.
虽然人人都心知肚明会走向巴别塔倒下的结局,但是,此时此刻还是请尽情享受一下诸神打盹间隙让人们再次拥抱住的世界大同美梦吧
On the light-hearted side, there are reports of Chinese users "helping" newcomers create their user names in Chinese. One means "helping old ladies jaywalk" and another innocuous looking one sounds the same as "rat poison".
Since there's no social taboo about discussing each other's salary, Chinese users are also asking these refugees how much they earn/what are their healthcare and education expenses etc, and getting quite an earful. Foreign users meanwhile are learning more about how ordinary Chinese people live from themselves. Someone came up with the cute term "对账/reconciling accounts" to describe such direct communications.
This post from a long-time Chinese user living abroad expresses some resentment towards the newcomers, she thinks the welcome they have received is indicative of their racial/language privileges. But the post still ended on a positive note -- it's good to see chinks in the wall letting light in on both sides, however fleetingly.
posted by of strange foe at 8:55 AM on January 15 [6 favorites]
it's good to see chinks in the wall letting light in on both sides, however fleetingly.That’s a hell of a word choice: “Chinks”. Probably safe to say its unintentional, yeah?
posted by jonnay at 7:51 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]
Oops, that's indeed entirely unintentional.
posted by of strange foe at 8:51 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]
posted by of strange foe at 8:51 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]
> Uh, I seem to have missed the US government propaganda campaign
Just saw someone on TikTok talking about this reference the $1.6 billion H.R.1157 - Countering the PRC Malign Influence Fund Authorization Act of 2023. I don't know how much of that would translate into funding direct "China Bad" propaganda, but it was news to me.
posted by lucidium at 1:26 PM on January 16 [3 favorites]
Just saw someone on TikTok talking about this reference the $1.6 billion H.R.1157 - Countering the PRC Malign Influence Fund Authorization Act of 2023. I don't know how much of that would translate into funding direct "China Bad" propaganda, but it was news to me.
posted by lucidium at 1:26 PM on January 16 [3 favorites]
RedNote may wall off “TikTok refugees” to prevent US influence on Chinese users. Rumors swirl that RedNote may segregate Chinese users as soon as next week.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:51 PM on January 16 [1 favorite]
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:51 PM on January 16 [1 favorite]
I'm gonna call it now, folks: there will be no TikTok ban. WE JUST CAN'T LOSE OUR TIKTOK.
(I say this as someone who doesn't even use it, but seriously....we're not gonna lose it.)
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:42 PM on January 16
(I say this as someone who doesn't even use it, but seriously....we're not gonna lose it.)
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:42 PM on January 16
fucking embarrassing
if it really was the national security risk they claimed it was, why didn't they act faster? if it still is, why is the biden administration punting this to trump, who they claimed was an existential threat to american democracy?
like, this just feels like it was such a unforced error. why was there the need to quickly pass the original bill when we had so many other things afire across the nation and the world? why are they now stumbling around trying to undo it, giving off post-vote "undo trump vote/undo brexit vote" energy?
if optics are so crucial to winning over the movable middle/centrists/disengaged majority or whatever, why do these damned fools fall for what seems like fake ginned up panics all the goddamned time?
just go ahead and ban it, you cowards. nobody believes you did it for national security anyway, and most seem to think that you're only doing it because it's china, with not a single care to how easy it is to buy data from american social media companies.
backtracking now isn't gonna win gen z back so easily
posted by i used to be someone else at 4:55 PM on January 16 [5 favorites]
if it really was the national security risk they claimed it was, why didn't they act faster? if it still is, why is the biden administration punting this to trump, who they claimed was an existential threat to american democracy?
like, this just feels like it was such a unforced error. why was there the need to quickly pass the original bill when we had so many other things afire across the nation and the world? why are they now stumbling around trying to undo it, giving off post-vote "undo trump vote/undo brexit vote" energy?
if optics are so crucial to winning over the movable middle/centrists/disengaged majority or whatever, why do these damned fools fall for what seems like fake ginned up panics all the goddamned time?
just go ahead and ban it, you cowards. nobody believes you did it for national security anyway, and most seem to think that you're only doing it because it's china, with not a single care to how easy it is to buy data from american social media companies.
backtracking now isn't gonna win gen z back so easily
posted by i used to be someone else at 4:55 PM on January 16 [5 favorites]
Roughly 50% of my FYP has this catchy song about the ban as the audio at the moment. It feels a bit like the montage scene at the end of an asteroid movie where everyone tries to make peace.
posted by lucidium at 6:15 PM on January 16 [1 favorite]
posted by lucidium at 6:15 PM on January 16 [1 favorite]
Will scan rest of thread, but just on this:
One common sentiment I hear—often especially in light of Trump—is that people would rather this information be in the hands of the Chinese government, which they have no relationship with, than the US government, which has all kinds of ways to retaliate against US residents.
That's basically the equation of many a resident of an authoritarian society. So, welcome? Additionally, that's why Threads have such an active sinophone presence with one reason being mainlanders can interact with taiwanese folks.
It'd be funny if that works out to a future where British ppl on a random Brazilian platform, Egyptians in a Chinese one etc
posted by cendawanita at 1:16 AM on January 17 [4 favorites]
One common sentiment I hear—often especially in light of Trump—is that people would rather this information be in the hands of the Chinese government, which they have no relationship with, than the US government, which has all kinds of ways to retaliate against US residents.
That's basically the equation of many a resident of an authoritarian society. So, welcome? Additionally, that's why Threads have such an active sinophone presence with one reason being mainlanders can interact with taiwanese folks.
It'd be funny if that works out to a future where British ppl on a random Brazilian platform, Egyptians in a Chinese one etc
posted by cendawanita at 1:16 AM on January 17 [4 favorites]
Ah ok, no one shared this yet, from Ryan Broderick, where he goes a bit into which social group began the snowball. To no one's surprise, much like a lot of American online culture (the fun and social side), it was Black Americans. I suspected the warm reception (or at least not explicitly racist due to cultural differences) must have accounted for this - certainly this was why western lo-fi solutions eg fediverse/mastodon, even Bluesky, failed hard at gaining social traction. (It reminds me that perhaps from that minority pov, having extremely good at curating algorithms must actually be a positive factor - that would be how queer Chinese content can get away with the iykyk strategy)
posted by cendawanita at 1:31 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 1:31 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
According to Fox12 Oregon by way of the Daily Show requirements for joining Rednote include agreeing to adhere to the Chinese constitution, practice socialist values, and promote the traditional culture of China.
I was working on a Rednote + Donghua Jinlong Glycine FPP for the impending ban.
I'll still try to post the later half for those still trying to understand the metamodern humor that BungaDunga & toastyk get, or the data nihilism many experience, without overloading the front page on TikTok USPolitics.
posted by rubatan at 3:09 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I was working on a Rednote + Donghua Jinlong Glycine FPP for the impending ban.
I'll still try to post the later half for those still trying to understand the metamodern humor that BungaDunga & toastyk get, or the data nihilism many experience, without overloading the front page on TikTok USPolitics.
posted by rubatan at 3:09 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Hopefully the Donghua Shinlong Glycine meme post helps makes sense of the metamodern (sincere but ironic) humor that drives some TikTok memes, including Rednote.
For all the sincere concerns national security wonks have about Rednote, the "don't tell me what to do"-become-freespeech humor TikTok users are exercising is in legitimate protest. It has the former group pulling their hair out in frustrated confusion. The Rednote protest vote (like Truth Social) will be an interesting test if the promise of social media is born out in its ability to disrupt political processes, or if governments will exercise increasing sophisticated control and surveillance of social media.
Maybe the US experiencing its just deserts? Its the only G20 member without privacy protections for consumers. What a coincidence! It can't implement a bill while controlling the worlds supply of social media and Biden warns of "extreme wealth, power and influence that really threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedom" by the ultra-wealthy "tech-industrial complex," only now that he's leaving office having lost the social media battle. If Trump can switch to delaying a TikTok ban, then maybe banning a Chinese-based company due to concerns of privacy violation will mix things up. Protestors flock to an app actually owned by the CCP. And the sinophobic legislation will make US domestic privacy palatable.🤞
ps Love the cross cultural connections being made! People are people everywhere. No matter what their governments are doing.
posted by rubatan at 4:53 AM on January 17 [5 favorites]
For all the sincere concerns national security wonks have about Rednote, the "don't tell me what to do"-become-freespeech humor TikTok users are exercising is in legitimate protest. It has the former group pulling their hair out in frustrated confusion. The Rednote protest vote (like Truth Social) will be an interesting test if the promise of social media is born out in its ability to disrupt political processes, or if governments will exercise increasing sophisticated control and surveillance of social media.
Maybe the US experiencing its just deserts? Its the only G20 member without privacy protections for consumers. What a coincidence! It can't implement a bill while controlling the worlds supply of social media and Biden warns of "extreme wealth, power and influence that really threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedom" by the ultra-wealthy "tech-industrial complex," only now that he's leaving office having lost the social media battle. If Trump can switch to delaying a TikTok ban, then maybe banning a Chinese-based company due to concerns of privacy violation will mix things up. Protestors flock to an app actually owned by the CCP. And the sinophobic legislation will make US domestic privacy palatable.🤞
ps Love the cross cultural connections being made! People are people everywhere. No matter what their governments are doing.
posted by rubatan at 4:53 AM on January 17 [5 favorites]
if it really was the national security risk they claimed it was, why didn't they act faster? if it still is, why is the biden administration punting this to trump, who they claimed was an existential threat to american democracy?
like, this just feels like it was such a unforced error. why was there the need to quickly pass the original bill when we had so many other things afire across the nation and the world? why are they now stumbling around trying to undo it, giving off post-vote "undo trump vote/undo brexit vote" energy?
The ban was a rider that was attached to an aid package.
posted by Fleebnork at 6:09 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
like, this just feels like it was such a unforced error. why was there the need to quickly pass the original bill when we had so many other things afire across the nation and the world? why are they now stumbling around trying to undo it, giving off post-vote "undo trump vote/undo brexit vote" energy?
The ban was a rider that was attached to an aid package.
posted by Fleebnork at 6:09 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I see a lot of "all the social media apps are like this" discourse above. To make sure we are calibrating...
In terms of privacy/data violations: yep! They are all like this.
In terms of election interference: potentially, they could all be bad; one is already actively dangerous.
The thing is, TikTok has been used to interfere in three elections so far, at large scale, in ways that swung or nearly swung the outcome: Georgia, Moldova, Romania. Nothing to this level has ever happened with another social media app. Influence, sure. Reversing the tide of an election in 15-20 days? Never before.
TikTok's official position on this is essentially: it didn't happen and if it did, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Given the voluminous evidence from EU investigations that it did happen, the generous position here is to consider Bytedance incompetent or negligent at a scale even beyond their peers.
The less generous interpretation is that the company either knew and let it happen, because it suited China's interests or China's allies (Russia), or that they were involved.
There are about 25 million people now whose elections were actively interfered with in unprecedented ways.
We're way beyond "it's gross that they track your activity, but they all do it."
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:21 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
In terms of privacy/data violations: yep! They are all like this.
In terms of election interference: potentially, they could all be bad; one is already actively dangerous.
The thing is, TikTok has been used to interfere in three elections so far, at large scale, in ways that swung or nearly swung the outcome: Georgia, Moldova, Romania. Nothing to this level has ever happened with another social media app. Influence, sure. Reversing the tide of an election in 15-20 days? Never before.
TikTok's official position on this is essentially: it didn't happen and if it did, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Given the voluminous evidence from EU investigations that it did happen, the generous position here is to consider Bytedance incompetent or negligent at a scale even beyond their peers.
The less generous interpretation is that the company either knew and let it happen, because it suited China's interests or China's allies (Russia), or that they were involved.
There are about 25 million people now whose elections were actively interfered with in unprecedented ways.
We're way beyond "it's gross that they track your activity, but they all do it."
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:21 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
TL;DR: none of these apps we're going into the mine with are really trustworthy, but TikTok's canary already died. It happened in Romania.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:28 AM on January 17
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:28 AM on January 17
Every American who's like "well, I'll give the Chinese government my data willingly" is definitely not one of Chinese or Taiwanese or Hong Kong descent. There are a lot of people who were already cautious on the app because they use it to connect with relatives or keep up with social ties from their background, and the extra attention from American users who don't have a direct connection to China can actually be threatening to those who do, even in the US.
And I wish Americans would keep that in mind before they Rednote-pill themselves into Uyghur genocide denial just because they see pretty pictures of food and parks in China. I'm already seeing people do that on X.
posted by toastyk at 6:43 AM on January 17 [8 favorites]
And I wish Americans would keep that in mind before they Rednote-pill themselves into Uyghur genocide denial just because they see pretty pictures of food and parks in China. I'm already seeing people do that on X.
posted by toastyk at 6:43 AM on January 17 [8 favorites]
Case in point: both countries fine people for being homeless.
posted by toastyk at 7:06 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by toastyk at 7:06 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Supreme Court upholds TikTok ban (CBS News article, SC opinion).
posted by box at 7:51 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by box at 7:51 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I've witnessed dozens of US high school students download it today. Maybe over 40, I lost count. I know this is also only anedata, but that last article about TT refugees (eyeroll) and memes spread really quickly.
I first heard about it Tuesday night from my 12 year old daughter, who mentioned that lots of people at her middle school are downloading it.
posted by ryanshepard at 8:00 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I first heard about it Tuesday night from my 12 year old daughter, who mentioned that lots of people at her middle school are downloading it.
posted by ryanshepard at 8:00 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
UNANIMOUSLY upholds the ban, which means we've finally found a topic on which your most and least favorite Justices can agree.
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 8:28 AM on January 17
posted by The Pluto Gangsta at 8:28 AM on January 17
I downloaded it because I already have a Chinese gacha game (no not that one, that one, or that one) that I play and regularly interact on the forums with Chinese users via the app’s auto-translate, and I was curious about connecting and learning more. Since there’s an influx of content accommodating to English speakers it seemed like a good time to take advantage of the opportunity to become more culturally literate.
So far my feed is Mandarin teachers giving basic lessons, crafting and cooking videos, horses, and some guy who does a scarily good Trump impersonation voice.
posted by brook horse at 8:47 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
So far my feed is Mandarin teachers giving basic lessons, crafting and cooking videos, horses, and some guy who does a scarily good Trump impersonation voice.
posted by brook horse at 8:47 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
In terms of election interference: potentially, they could all be bad; one is already actively dangerous.
With kindness, can you hear yourself? What just happened with the election in your country? My Canadian extended family is all on facebook as their main social media platform. I had an aunt come out to visit in October. A retired woman living in Cape Breton. We started talking about the US election and I could not believe the things she was saying. Asking 'what has Kamala actually done' and 'what about her character' and 'isn't she just a DEI candidate'? She wasn't getting those ideas from Canadian media. She's not out there reading metafilter and American political think-pieces.
Interference campaigns are conducted on the platform where their users are.
posted by kitcat at 9:03 AM on January 17 [4 favorites]
With kindness, can you hear yourself? What just happened with the election in your country? My Canadian extended family is all on facebook as their main social media platform. I had an aunt come out to visit in October. A retired woman living in Cape Breton. We started talking about the US election and I could not believe the things she was saying. Asking 'what has Kamala actually done' and 'what about her character' and 'isn't she just a DEI candidate'? She wasn't getting those ideas from Canadian media. She's not out there reading metafilter and American political think-pieces.
Interference campaigns are conducted on the platform where their users are.
posted by kitcat at 9:03 AM on January 17 [4 favorites]
Things can be true in very different degrees.
Unhealthy situations in how information is presented on various social media apps enhancing negative voting trends is not the same as a foreign government illegally pumping in millions of dollars and rapidly deploying thousands of accounts to flip an election in a span of 15 days via vulnerabilities in a single app.
You don't have to take my word that this is qualitatively different. You can read the reports from the EU investigation, ask people in infosec.
This is not a fringe opinion I have. Literally, it's the talk of one continent and a worldwide industry.
Hand-wavey "they're all the same" response may feel fine on this side of the pond, but three countries one after another have seen their elections skew suddenly, dangerously pro-Russia, via one app, in less than the time it takes for a carton of milk to go off.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:12 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Unhealthy situations in how information is presented on various social media apps enhancing negative voting trends is not the same as a foreign government illegally pumping in millions of dollars and rapidly deploying thousands of accounts to flip an election in a span of 15 days via vulnerabilities in a single app.
You don't have to take my word that this is qualitatively different. You can read the reports from the EU investigation, ask people in infosec.
This is not a fringe opinion I have. Literally, it's the talk of one continent and a worldwide industry.
Hand-wavey "they're all the same" response may feel fine on this side of the pond, but three countries one after another have seen their elections skew suddenly, dangerously pro-Russia, via one app, in less than the time it takes for a carton of milk to go off.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:12 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
What's so devastating about this, to me at least, is that TikTok has become the social media platform for leftist organizing - particularly amongst Gen Z, but increasingly amongst older generations too.
This article is old, but -
Along the way, Gen Z’s progressive TikTokers have discovered something about the platform that the brightest political minds in Washington have yet to fully grasp: that TikTok is a forum for political action, not just a tool for reaching would-be voters. Communications staffers on Capitol Hill look at TikTok and see another channel for spreading messaging to potential voters; meanwhile, the new generation of online organizers look at TikTok and see an entire universe of forms of direct action. After all, why lobby lawmakers to take down an anti-critical race theory snitch line when a handful of Zoomers with their iPhones can break it instead?
For anyone who wants TikTok gone or is even just indifferent: do you really understand what's being lost?
posted by kitcat at 9:21 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
This article is old, but -
Along the way, Gen Z’s progressive TikTokers have discovered something about the platform that the brightest political minds in Washington have yet to fully grasp: that TikTok is a forum for political action, not just a tool for reaching would-be voters. Communications staffers on Capitol Hill look at TikTok and see another channel for spreading messaging to potential voters; meanwhile, the new generation of online organizers look at TikTok and see an entire universe of forms of direct action. After all, why lobby lawmakers to take down an anti-critical race theory snitch line when a handful of Zoomers with their iPhones can break it instead?
For anyone who wants TikTok gone or is even just indifferent: do you really understand what's being lost?
posted by kitcat at 9:21 AM on January 17 [3 favorites]
If the argument you're making is, "None of us should be going into any of these coalmines" I am 100% with you. Ban (or heavily regulate) all these apps then, sure.
If the argument you are making is, "All the canaries will probably die eventually anyway, why worry about a particular one that just dropped dead?" I am not sure I understand your logic.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:23 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
If the argument you are making is, "All the canaries will probably die eventually anyway, why worry about a particular one that just dropped dead?" I am not sure I understand your logic.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:23 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I do think it will be a loss if/when TikTok is banned, but my trust that young political organizers will regroup elsewhere is higher than my trust that an app governments have shown they can use to rapidly swing elections won't be used that way again.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:27 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:27 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I see Tiktok as a platform where we have a real fighting chance against fascism. As the Donghua Jinlong Glycine trend demonstrates well, people are extremely clever coming up with ways to subvert existing power structures. It's a very fast-moving platform and there's danger in that and there's opportunity for good.
I do think all of the social media platforms are horribly dangerous - I think FB is the worst if you can't tell. But getting rid of the one where the leftists are hanging out isn't the solution people think it's going to be.
posted by kitcat at 9:32 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
I do think all of the social media platforms are horribly dangerous - I think FB is the worst if you can't tell. But getting rid of the one where the leftists are hanging out isn't the solution people think it's going to be.
posted by kitcat at 9:32 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
I think the disagreement we are having is that you're lumping large-scale, rapidly deployed, state-funded cyberwarfare in with other forms of deleterious social media content/influence. Or, at the least, treating it as incidental that while any social media platform theoretically could be vulnerable to this, one particular one has had it actually happen, three times, in short succession.
I... do not see it that way.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:38 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
I... do not see it that way.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:38 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
Fair, but I think you're placing too much emphasis on large-scale, sudden, state-funded cyberwarfare without worrying enough about insidious, gradual, state-funded and state-adjacent cyberwarfare (hi Russia, India, China and Republican and Canadian Conservative christo-fascists).
posted by kitcat at 9:46 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by kitcat at 9:46 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I do worry about those, yeah. But as they exist on the other apps, they're fragmented and incremental and seem like they're at a scale regulation could address.
(Not that we're likely getting any).
TikTok, by comparison, has, since mid-November done most of the work for installing a pro-Russian puppet in Romania, one who thinks caesarean sections kill the baby's soul and Pepsi has microchips that allow the Jews to monitor your brain.
Romania is where half my family lives. I'd rather people just learn to organize on a different app than see this happen, frankly.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:51 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
(Not that we're likely getting any).
TikTok, by comparison, has, since mid-November done most of the work for installing a pro-Russian puppet in Romania, one who thinks caesarean sections kill the baby's soul and Pepsi has microchips that allow the Jews to monitor your brain.
Romania is where half my family lives. I'd rather people just learn to organize on a different app than see this happen, frankly.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:51 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Although everyone knows that the Tower of Babel will eventually fall, at this moment, please let us enjoy the interlude while the gods doze off, and let people once again embrace the dream of A world in Harmony.
虽然人人都心知肚明会走向巴别塔倒下的结局,但是,此时此刻还是请尽情享受一下诸神打盹间隙让人们再次拥抱住的世界大同美梦吧
Deja vu --> OLD Internet!
"No one owns cyberspace; we treat censorship like a virus and just flow around it; we will pop up again with another nym [in a new form]."
While 한새 rant about "leaders should" "platforms must" ... 황새 are just moving on, flowing to where they can get what they need
Kids [humans] Just want to have fun :-)
#Baepsae #SoftPower
posted by Surfurrus at 10:02 AM on January 17
虽然人人都心知肚明会走向巴别塔倒下的结局,但是,此时此刻还是请尽情享受一下诸神打盹间隙让人们再次拥抱住的世界大同美梦吧
Deja vu --> OLD Internet!
"No one owns cyberspace; we treat censorship like a virus and just flow around it; we will pop up again with another nym [in a new form]."
While 한새 rant about "leaders should" "platforms must" ... 황새 are just moving on, flowing to where they can get what they need
Kids [humans] Just want to have fun :-)
#Baepsae #SoftPower
posted by Surfurrus at 10:02 AM on January 17
Are we bringing that up to say let's also ban Facebook (hell yes!) or strictly as good-old-fashioned Russian style whataboutism?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:30 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:30 AM on January 17 [2 favorites]
I'll shut up though. There's a disconnect here where people are unwilling to differentiate between fragmented, incremental influence or even, organized marginal influence and short-term intense cyberwarfare. That, plus some folks feel the positive effects TikTok provides via organizing, free speech, etc. outweigh the loss of the occasional democracy, since vulnerable democracies are gonna get got by someone, sooner or later, anyway.
I can see some pragmatic logic in those arguments, but I can't join you there.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:50 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
I can see some pragmatic logic in those arguments, but I can't join you there.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:50 AM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Every American who's like "well, I'll give the Chinese government my data willingly" is definitely not one of Chinese or Taiwanese or Hong Kong descent.
And if you are one of these CN/TW/HKers who brings this up, they get super uncomfortable because you're the one ruining their fun memes about being saved by big handsome daddy Xi, who will bring them high speed rail and fresh lobster for Christmas. Best case scenario, they ignore you. Worst case scenario, they start maligning you as a CIA plant. Ok, sorry that it's so inconvenient for you that I don't want my family to get blown up by the PLA!
This is because we're all just one interchangeable and inscrutable yellow mass of people to them, so any harm that has or will come to us isn't "real." Or at least, not as real to them as the pain they might feel from losing access to one dopamine scrolly app. I am so very tired.
posted by cultanthropologist at 1:31 PM on January 17 [4 favorites]
And if you are one of these CN/TW/HKers who brings this up, they get super uncomfortable because you're the one ruining their fun memes about being saved by big handsome daddy Xi, who will bring them high speed rail and fresh lobster for Christmas. Best case scenario, they ignore you. Worst case scenario, they start maligning you as a CIA plant. Ok, sorry that it's so inconvenient for you that I don't want my family to get blown up by the PLA!
This is because we're all just one interchangeable and inscrutable yellow mass of people to them, so any harm that has or will come to us isn't "real." Or at least, not as real to them as the pain they might feel from losing access to one dopamine scrolly app. I am so very tired.
posted by cultanthropologist at 1:31 PM on January 17 [4 favorites]
Also, the CEO of TikTok just personally thanked Donald Trump "for his commitment to work with us." Even if TT survives, seems pretty unlikely that it'll survive as some sort of haven for leftist organizing.
posted by cultanthropologist at 1:46 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
posted by cultanthropologist at 1:46 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
You are tired, and I am tired of listening to the takes of people who haven't used TT and don't seem to have much a clue about it.
Even if TT survives, seems pretty unlikely that it'll survive as some sort of haven for leftist organizing.
Sshhh. Not too loud. The leftists on TikTok will continue to come up with novel ways to get past the censorship, if it survives.
posted by kitcat at 1:57 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
Even if TT survives, seems pretty unlikely that it'll survive as some sort of haven for leftist organizing.
Sshhh. Not too loud. The leftists on TikTok will continue to come up with novel ways to get past the censorship, if it survives.
posted by kitcat at 1:57 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
> cultanthropologist: "Also, the CEO of TikTok just personally thanked Donald Trump "for his commitment to work with us." Even if TT survives, seems pretty unlikely that it'll survive as some sort of haven for leftist organizing."
It seems the implication here is that the way that TikTok survives is if Chew promises to Trump that TikTok will suppress left-leaning content. I think the flaw in this reasoning is that it assumes that Trump cares about left-leaning content on TikTok rather than, say, getting a big payoff or even just the ego-stroke of having China (as embodied by ByteDance/TikTok/Chew) perform acts of public submission. I think it's pretty apparent how susceptible Trump is to both bribes as well as personal flattery and such displays of dominance/submission.
posted by mhum at 5:43 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
It seems the implication here is that the way that TikTok survives is if Chew promises to Trump that TikTok will suppress left-leaning content. I think the flaw in this reasoning is that it assumes that Trump cares about left-leaning content on TikTok rather than, say, getting a big payoff or even just the ego-stroke of having China (as embodied by ByteDance/TikTok/Chew) perform acts of public submission. I think it's pretty apparent how susceptible Trump is to both bribes as well as personal flattery and such displays of dominance/submission.
posted by mhum at 5:43 PM on January 17 [2 favorites]
One way for it to survive is for it to be taken over in some part by a consortium of MAGA billionaires, possibly still with ByteDance involved but with enough US ownership to arguably satisfy the law. And Trump might not care, but if you put a Thiel, Andreesen, and Musk triumvirate in charge of it, it's going to go to shit.
posted by BungaDunga at 7:11 PM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by BungaDunga at 7:11 PM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Trump is a social media owner. He has no incentive to permit regulation in Trumpland.
posted by rubatan at 7:50 PM on January 17 [1 favorite]
posted by rubatan at 7:50 PM on January 17 [1 favorite]
Zuckerberg and Musk are compliant, which makes their products "safe". TikTok can't be directly controlled by the US government, so it is a national security "problem". That's why there is a ban, with the underlying goal always being to transfer TikTok's ownership and data to an (American) owner who is compliant.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:51 PM on January 17 [3 favorites]
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:51 PM on January 17 [3 favorites]
@ DirtyOldTown do you have the EU investigation report links for Romania, Moldova, Georgia?
posted by rubatan at 3:34 AM on January 18
posted by rubatan at 3:34 AM on January 18
Every American who's like "well, I'll give the Chinese government my data willingly" is definitely not one of Chinese or Taiwanese or Hong Kong descent.
Yeah. It really comes down to people seeing the threat to them as being greater under TFG/facetweet as opposed to Xi/TikTok. Which, okay. Sure. But to follow that up with a sweeping dismissal of the harms caused by TikTok really, really starts to look like "losing access to one dopamine scrolly app" is the driver above everything else.
If I had my way all social media would be regulated like the psychological weapons they are. But since this is specifically about a TikTok ban, discussing the harms caused by TikTok while limiting the "what about facebook/twitter" seems like a fair ask.
The harms unique to TikTok are that it shows you exactly what you want to see. This is different than Facetube. That shows you what they think maximizes engagement, which isn't the same thing. It's why no matter what you do-- even using a clean browser in a VM with noscript and ublock-- on youtube you eventually get right wing ragebait.
Having the app instead just show you what pushes your custom Dopamine Button is a different kind of insidious, and that is worth discussing. The Button in the hand of a (different) hostile government is also worth discussing. Because as cultanthropologist notes, this is not a minor distinction.
Turning off (or altering) The Dopamine Button for people who aren't toeing the party line is absolutely in character here. The notion that they'll "only" ("ONLY") do it to Chinese or Taiwanese nationals, or "only" to dissidents in Hong Kong or Hungary is a fantasy. The Chinese government absolutely has a vested interest in getting US voters to behave in a way that benefits the Chinese government. The app is (and will be) used to those ends. Anyone's that's voluntarily giving them their psych profile and The Button is not acting in their own best interest.
No, it doesn't excuse the US government. No, it doesn't excuse facebook/twitter/youtube. But it looks like everything keeps getting derailed back to that.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 4:06 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
Yeah. It really comes down to people seeing the threat to them as being greater under TFG/facetweet as opposed to Xi/TikTok. Which, okay. Sure. But to follow that up with a sweeping dismissal of the harms caused by TikTok really, really starts to look like "losing access to one dopamine scrolly app" is the driver above everything else.
If I had my way all social media would be regulated like the psychological weapons they are. But since this is specifically about a TikTok ban, discussing the harms caused by TikTok while limiting the "what about facebook/twitter" seems like a fair ask.
The harms unique to TikTok are that it shows you exactly what you want to see. This is different than Facetube. That shows you what they think maximizes engagement, which isn't the same thing. It's why no matter what you do-- even using a clean browser in a VM with noscript and ublock-- on youtube you eventually get right wing ragebait.
Having the app instead just show you what pushes your custom Dopamine Button is a different kind of insidious, and that is worth discussing. The Button in the hand of a (different) hostile government is also worth discussing. Because as cultanthropologist notes, this is not a minor distinction.
Turning off (or altering) The Dopamine Button for people who aren't toeing the party line is absolutely in character here. The notion that they'll "only" ("ONLY") do it to Chinese or Taiwanese nationals, or "only" to dissidents in Hong Kong or Hungary is a fantasy. The Chinese government absolutely has a vested interest in getting US voters to behave in a way that benefits the Chinese government. The app is (and will be) used to those ends. Anyone's that's voluntarily giving them their psych profile and The Button is not acting in their own best interest.
No, it doesn't excuse the US government. No, it doesn't excuse facebook/twitter/youtube. But it looks like everything keeps getting derailed back to that.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 4:06 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
Sticking firmly on the people-level view, I can't deny the comments collected here from China users leaves me a little teary, because this has also been a crack in the wall for them too (and if you're wondering, since they're joking about censors being lax as the lunar new year is coming, it's slated to fall by the end of January, so less than two weeks): Netizen Voices on TikTok “Refugees”: “We All Know This Isn’t Going to End Well, so Let’s Enjoy This ‘Global-village Moment’ While We Can”
And I think that's key. States will want to foment disruption but if enough Americans can remember the Chinese as normal people, also restricted by a different flavour of authoritarianism but nonetheless captured, maybe that would go a long way.
I wish I can fully get on board on the action part that follows the valid criticisms of TikTok, but not when they're spearhead by a country whose key concerns on this has less to do with human rights but rather being upset that they lost monopoly in the propaganda industry as well as access to/ backdoor privacy tools. Spent the whole of today daydreaming a social media space run by something like the UN (lollll I know).
posted by cendawanita at 4:55 AM on January 18 [4 favorites]
And I think that's key. States will want to foment disruption but if enough Americans can remember the Chinese as normal people, also restricted by a different flavour of authoritarianism but nonetheless captured, maybe that would go a long way.
I wish I can fully get on board on the action part that follows the valid criticisms of TikTok, but not when they're spearhead by a country whose key concerns on this has less to do with human rights but rather being upset that they lost monopoly in the propaganda industry as well as access to/ backdoor privacy tools. Spent the whole of today daydreaming a social media space run by something like the UN (lollll I know).
posted by cendawanita at 4:55 AM on January 18 [4 favorites]
– 24 Hours Remain –
A brief statement from TikTok today:
A brief statement from TikTok today:
Unless the Biden Administration immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers assuring non-enforcement, unfortunately TikTok will be forced to go dark on January 19.posted by lucidium at 5:18 AM on January 18
Spent the whole of today daydreaming a social media space run by something like the UN (lollll I know).
IIRC, Mastodon is transitioning to an EU-based nonprofit.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 6:13 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
IIRC, Mastodon is transitioning to an EU-based nonprofit.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 6:13 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
It's why no matter what you do-- even using a clean browser in a VM with noscript and ublock-- on youtube you eventually get right wing ragebait.
Not necessarily disagreeing with the rest of your post, but I see this sentiment a lot—particularly on Metafilter—and it has never, not once, happened to me or my partner, who have been on Youtube for years. As far as I know it hasn’t happened to any of my friends my age despite them also being huge consumers of Youtube (and the kind of person who would post a screed in the group chat if it happened).
I say this specifically because I suspect there’s some kind of demographic targeting at play for this experience. I don’t know your age but I know I am about 15-20 years younger than your average MeFite (where I see this experience most discussed), so it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s some age line that separates this tactic from… whatever they’re doing to people my age. Youtube only gives me what I like too, to the point where it’s incredibly difficult to find new content especially outside my general niches.
Which is important to be aware of for tactics purposes. Because it’s entirely possible that younger users are being targeted by The Dopamine Machine across platforms. Is it that TikTok serves you what you want to see, or is it that people in a certain age demographic are targeted by “serves you what you want to see” as an algorithmic tactic, and that demographic is also the one primarily using TikTok? And is that tactic deployed on sites other than TikTok?
Because, again, I have never seen ANY of the right wing stuff, or any kind of trending content, come up on my Youtube. I have no idea who the fuck Mr. Beast is, he’s never been recommended to me and I know of his existent through Tumblr memes alone. On Youtube I only get the same content that I came on there looking for, always. Same for my partner, who has Youtube up constantly. But so many MeFites have talked about a different experience that something is clearly happening in how Youtube works for me and folks like me.
posted by brook horse at 7:53 AM on January 18 [2 favorites]
Not necessarily disagreeing with the rest of your post, but I see this sentiment a lot—particularly on Metafilter—and it has never, not once, happened to me or my partner, who have been on Youtube for years. As far as I know it hasn’t happened to any of my friends my age despite them also being huge consumers of Youtube (and the kind of person who would post a screed in the group chat if it happened).
I say this specifically because I suspect there’s some kind of demographic targeting at play for this experience. I don’t know your age but I know I am about 15-20 years younger than your average MeFite (where I see this experience most discussed), so it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s some age line that separates this tactic from… whatever they’re doing to people my age. Youtube only gives me what I like too, to the point where it’s incredibly difficult to find new content especially outside my general niches.
Which is important to be aware of for tactics purposes. Because it’s entirely possible that younger users are being targeted by The Dopamine Machine across platforms. Is it that TikTok serves you what you want to see, or is it that people in a certain age demographic are targeted by “serves you what you want to see” as an algorithmic tactic, and that demographic is also the one primarily using TikTok? And is that tactic deployed on sites other than TikTok?
Because, again, I have never seen ANY of the right wing stuff, or any kind of trending content, come up on my Youtube. I have no idea who the fuck Mr. Beast is, he’s never been recommended to me and I know of his existent through Tumblr memes alone. On Youtube I only get the same content that I came on there looking for, always. Same for my partner, who has Youtube up constantly. But so many MeFites have talked about a different experience that something is clearly happening in how Youtube works for me and folks like me.
posted by brook horse at 7:53 AM on January 18 [2 favorites]
Mastodon isn’t a platform with a single owner the way that TikTok, etc. are. Mastodon is free software that lets you run a server for others to have accounts on. There are also several forks of that software to create interoperable servers with different features. What the organization that created the original mastodon server software does has little impact on the fediverse (other than the fact that they happen to run their own too-large-to-moderate server that is a common source of spam but also people often join it first before they learn better so it has a lot of users).
My partner and I run a server for about twenty of our real life friends, on a couple of computers in our basement. Moderation is easy because we see these people in person on the regular. Federation means our users have access to the whole greater network, excluding the nazi servers we don’t connect with. There are tons of little servers like ours in the network. We’re not going anywhere.
Here’s a company that offers mastodon server hosting as a service for $6/month. I’ve been meaning to try it to see how it is for non-technical people to use, but it might be an option for creating something for yourself and your friends.
posted by antinomia at 7:56 AM on January 18
My partner and I run a server for about twenty of our real life friends, on a couple of computers in our basement. Moderation is easy because we see these people in person on the regular. Federation means our users have access to the whole greater network, excluding the nazi servers we don’t connect with. There are tons of little servers like ours in the network. We’re not going anywhere.
Here’s a company that offers mastodon server hosting as a service for $6/month. I’ve been meaning to try it to see how it is for non-technical people to use, but it might be an option for creating something for yourself and your friends.
posted by antinomia at 7:56 AM on January 18
"Not necessarily disagreeing with the rest of your post, but I see this sentiment a lot—particularly on Metafilter—and it has never, not once, happened to me or my partner, who have been on Youtube for years."
Because it's not true and wasn't even true when this was a much bigger issue on YouTube in the late 2010s.
posted by Captaintripps at 8:01 AM on January 18
Because it's not true and wasn't even true when this was a much bigger issue on YouTube in the late 2010s.
posted by Captaintripps at 8:01 AM on January 18
I'm 44, and I see right-wing garbage so rarely on TikTok that when it happens, I strongly suspect fuckery. It's an interesting theory, though. It's made me think of something - do we actually know that people on the 'right-wing' side of these algorithms get fed progressive content? Or do we only know that people on the progressive side of it are being fed right-wing garbage because it's happened to us?
posted by kitcat at 8:04 AM on January 18
posted by kitcat at 8:04 AM on January 18
Captaintripps: Aww. I was ready for there to be a complicated age-related conspiracy.
posted by brook horse at 8:04 AM on January 18
posted by brook horse at 8:04 AM on January 18
>Captaintripps: Aww. I was ready for there to be a complicated age-related conspiracy.
YouTube Shorts has occasionally served up content that moves from "interesting fiddly building projects" (fun!) to "historical arms and combat" (ok interesting) to "niche firearms demonstrations" (okaay I hope they don't sneak some "protecting your God given rights" narrative...) to "yeah we're just shooting guns and playing commando and doesn't this look like a way to feel powerful?" (Nope already too far).
The "my kid was watching unboxing videos and then suddenly someone is explaining that every race works to help people like them it's just natural" hasn't happened to me personally but similarly abrupt surprises definitely were more common back in the pre-pandemic days.
Occam's razor would suggest "they used to use only engagement as the metric to push new content and they probably refined that approach based on lots of feedback" more than "it's all made up and never happened" (I know that wasn't your point Brook Horse but Captain I don't think it's entirely true what you wrote).
posted by Lenie Clarke at 8:17 AM on January 18
YouTube Shorts has occasionally served up content that moves from "interesting fiddly building projects" (fun!) to "historical arms and combat" (ok interesting) to "niche firearms demonstrations" (okaay I hope they don't sneak some "protecting your God given rights" narrative...) to "yeah we're just shooting guns and playing commando and doesn't this look like a way to feel powerful?" (Nope already too far).
The "my kid was watching unboxing videos and then suddenly someone is explaining that every race works to help people like them it's just natural" hasn't happened to me personally but similarly abrupt surprises definitely were more common back in the pre-pandemic days.
Occam's razor would suggest "they used to use only engagement as the metric to push new content and they probably refined that approach based on lots of feedback" more than "it's all made up and never happened" (I know that wasn't your point Brook Horse but Captain I don't think it's entirely true what you wrote).
posted by Lenie Clarke at 8:17 AM on January 18
The claim was "...no matter what you do-- even using a clean browser in a VM with noscript and ublock-- on youtube you eventually get right wing ragebait" and as someone who makes their living in part on understanding how YouTube serves up recommendations, that's where my objection comes from.
There was a period of time when watchtime was the overriding factor within YouTube's algorithms and it ended up being very dumb in that once you got hooked into any category, all you got was that category. The example I used to use at conferences was petunias. But, because a large group of people ended up in right-wing loops, that story in its own right lended itself to liberal ragebait folk stories that "no matter what you do...you eventually get right wing ragebait."
"Right wing ragebait" is also ill-defined. I've seen people claim that for a single Joe Rogan video showing up in suggested videos in the website sidebar. Which, yes, a lot of his content covers that, but it's also a misunderstanding of the massive audience that show has which spreads way beyond your MAGA uncle.
Your example is a better one (I've seen that myself), but there is obviously a large cohort of people whose viewing behaviour does, in fact, lend itself to that funnel. They are videos they're interested in and want to watch. The what happens next part of it is where it seems to be just so stories to me or, charitably, exaggeration about the current state of YouTube recommendations.
posted by Captaintripps at 8:31 AM on January 18 [2 favorites]
There was a period of time when watchtime was the overriding factor within YouTube's algorithms and it ended up being very dumb in that once you got hooked into any category, all you got was that category. The example I used to use at conferences was petunias. But, because a large group of people ended up in right-wing loops, that story in its own right lended itself to liberal ragebait folk stories that "no matter what you do...you eventually get right wing ragebait."
"Right wing ragebait" is also ill-defined. I've seen people claim that for a single Joe Rogan video showing up in suggested videos in the website sidebar. Which, yes, a lot of his content covers that, but it's also a misunderstanding of the massive audience that show has which spreads way beyond your MAGA uncle.
Your example is a better one (I've seen that myself), but there is obviously a large cohort of people whose viewing behaviour does, in fact, lend itself to that funnel. They are videos they're interested in and want to watch. The what happens next part of it is where it seems to be just so stories to me or, charitably, exaggeration about the current state of YouTube recommendations.
posted by Captaintripps at 8:31 AM on January 18 [2 favorites]
The claim was "...no matter what you do-- even using a clean browser in a VM with noscript and ublock-- on youtube you eventually get right wing ragebait" and as someone who makes their living in part on understanding how YouTube serves up recommendations, that's where my objection comes from.
There was a period of time when watchtime was the overriding factor within YouTube's algorithms and it ended up being very dumb in that once you got hooked into any category, all you got was that category. The example I used to use at conferences was petunias. But, because a large group of people ended up in right-wing loops, that story in its own right lended itself to liberal ragebait folk stories that "no matter what you do...you eventually get right wing ragebait."
I'll address this in two parts.
1) Joe Rogan. Yeah, that's something I consider right wing political content. Regardless of the breadth of his audience, he's carrying water for Musk and TFG. I can't be bothered to try from a clean session (VM, etc) but I'm pretty sure if you start from a clean slate watching Joe Rogan you end up in the funnel pretty quickly.
2) Instead of Petunias, try electric guitar/bass. Because that was my experience. The distance from "here's an interesting pre-CBS stratocaster" to right-wing political BS was short. Whether it's the case that some interests carry default demographic assumptions if The Algorithm doesn't have any of your data to go on or it's because that was how youtube's recommendations worked for a given time and place honestly doesn't matter all that much to me. Youtube is a sewer. I avoid it as much as practical.
However, I will say that if my assertion is factually incorrect here in the year 2025 I'm perfectly happy for someone with more up to date technical knowledge to correct it. If you want to make a post on how it currently works, that may provide value to a lot of people.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 8:53 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
There was a period of time when watchtime was the overriding factor within YouTube's algorithms and it ended up being very dumb in that once you got hooked into any category, all you got was that category. The example I used to use at conferences was petunias. But, because a large group of people ended up in right-wing loops, that story in its own right lended itself to liberal ragebait folk stories that "no matter what you do...you eventually get right wing ragebait."
I'll address this in two parts.
1) Joe Rogan. Yeah, that's something I consider right wing political content. Regardless of the breadth of his audience, he's carrying water for Musk and TFG. I can't be bothered to try from a clean session (VM, etc) but I'm pretty sure if you start from a clean slate watching Joe Rogan you end up in the funnel pretty quickly.
2) Instead of Petunias, try electric guitar/bass. Because that was my experience. The distance from "here's an interesting pre-CBS stratocaster" to right-wing political BS was short. Whether it's the case that some interests carry default demographic assumptions if The Algorithm doesn't have any of your data to go on or it's because that was how youtube's recommendations worked for a given time and place honestly doesn't matter all that much to me. Youtube is a sewer. I avoid it as much as practical.
However, I will say that if my assertion is factually incorrect here in the year 2025 I'm perfectly happy for someone with more up to date technical knowledge to correct it. If you want to make a post on how it currently works, that may provide value to a lot of people.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 8:53 AM on January 18 [1 favorite]
(But since this is a thread about TikTok... probably best that it were it's own post.)
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 8:56 AM on January 18
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 8:56 AM on January 18
I would also appreciate such a post. It's so important that we understand better how the various content algorithms work. I might even end up looking for another platform. I won't be joining RedNote, as tempting as it is, because it just isn't fair to the Chinese citizens who'll face increased scrutiny on that app, or the ex-pats who are on there because they're homesick but their IPs are about to get cut off from the Chinese content.
posted by kitcat at 9:15 AM on January 18
posted by kitcat at 9:15 AM on January 18
idk if it's stockholm syndrome or what, but YouTube has hardly ever led me to rightwing content. If it did I'd spend a lot less time on it. Here's my front page for reference:
VFX Artists React to MEGALOPOLIS
Building My Dream Productivity Device
Sleepaway Camp - This Aged Great!
Magazine Cameras: a Photographic Missing Link
How many black holes are in the solar system?
Drinking the world's highest pressure soda
New law would ban marriages between people who don't love each other
The second best space sim ever made
Ancient stone chambers in New England?
Transmeta: A CPU Revolution that never was
The Making of LEGO Island: A Documentary
I ran PS3 Games on PS5 Silicon to prove Sony wrong
A unique satellite reaction wheel
Why is it that NO greek temple has a roof on it anymore?
Why Skyrim's cities feel realistic (and starfield's seem fake)
I am the only one who understands Halo CE's art direction
Liber indigo (part one)- Metaphysical prisoners of the desktop
How the game boy color gave original game boy games color
OK Go - A Stone Only Rolls Downhill
Truly Stunning Io Images and Groundbreaking Jupiter Science from NASA's Juno probe
I'm sure it occasionally throws up a rightwing video deep into the suggested videos on the right hand side but, it's the internet. it would be crazy if youtube never, ever suggested anything weird or bad.
posted by BungaDunga at 9:57 AM on January 18
VFX Artists React to MEGALOPOLIS
Building My Dream Productivity Device
Sleepaway Camp - This Aged Great!
Magazine Cameras: a Photographic Missing Link
How many black holes are in the solar system?
Drinking the world's highest pressure soda
New law would ban marriages between people who don't love each other
The second best space sim ever made
Ancient stone chambers in New England?
Transmeta: A CPU Revolution that never was
The Making of LEGO Island: A Documentary
I ran PS3 Games on PS5 Silicon to prove Sony wrong
A unique satellite reaction wheel
Why is it that NO greek temple has a roof on it anymore?
Why Skyrim's cities feel realistic (and starfield's seem fake)
I am the only one who understands Halo CE's art direction
Liber indigo (part one)- Metaphysical prisoners of the desktop
How the game boy color gave original game boy games color
OK Go - A Stone Only Rolls Downhill
Truly Stunning Io Images and Groundbreaking Jupiter Science from NASA's Juno probe
I'm sure it occasionally throws up a rightwing video deep into the suggested videos on the right hand side but, it's the internet. it would be crazy if youtube never, ever suggested anything weird or bad.
posted by BungaDunga at 9:57 AM on January 18
So here's some fuckery. I started watching TikTok and the third video in is from From Rand Paul. He said he's joined TT today as an 'act of civil disobedience' and urges everyone 'don't give up, don't give in, resist'. I didn't think much of it. He's a democrat, right? Plus, he's just another politician trying to kiss up to American viewers, right? Except...half an hour later I see another video that clues me in to the fact that he's a Republican. I had to scroll all the way back to watch the video again. Sure enough, it's his account and it has a verified checkmark.
You can't join TikTok, get a verified checkmark immediately and have a video go viral on the left side of TT organically. Even if you get to keep TT in the US, it's over.
posted by kitcat at 12:08 PM on January 18
You can't join TikTok, get a verified checkmark immediately and have a video go viral on the left side of TT organically. Even if you get to keep TT in the US, it's over.
posted by kitcat at 12:08 PM on January 18
I just watched this heartfelt and persuasive video from the singer Jax
Goodbye, TikTok
posted by Glinn at 2:12 PM on January 18 [1 favorite]
Goodbye, TikTok
posted by Glinn at 2:12 PM on January 18 [1 favorite]
I have often said here that YouTube is my primary source of screen time, and I do not see any rage bait. I have been a paid subscriber for at least a couple years, and maybe that makes a difference. I’m sure I got a little when I started? But I told it every time to not show me anything from each channel that came up, and it’s been quite a long time since I’ve seen anything like that - unless I’m following the presidential campaign or something too closely - but it didn’t take long to remind it not to show the ragebait.
I don’t know if it used to take longer, or if it really is better in 2025, but I very happily get only pleasant content including painters, crafters and other artist people, mudlarking and bottle digging people, various kinds of miniatures makers, movie reviews, art history and other things I like for stress-less watching. And obviously cute animals. And not AI ones, I hate AI animals so much.
I will say that when I am not logged in I definitely get rage bait, but I don’t know if it tends toward showing that. I think it also shows more progressive stuff if I’m not logged in. But that’s because I’m an anonymous user with no history. It genuinely hopes to keep you watching as long as it can, and it does not benefit its masters if you get mad and turn it off, whether they are themselves uber fascists or not.
I joined TikTok once briefly, became alarmed by getting trapped in cute dog and horse videos for 4 hours, was possibly accidentally shown a video of a cute animal that did not end well, and deleted my account.
I was going to join and post a cute dog video on RedNote. This thread has not convinced me one way or the other if that is a bad idea, but maybe I skimmed it too quickly.
posted by Glinn at 2:43 PM on January 18 [3 favorites]
I don’t know if it used to take longer, or if it really is better in 2025, but I very happily get only pleasant content including painters, crafters and other artist people, mudlarking and bottle digging people, various kinds of miniatures makers, movie reviews, art history and other things I like for stress-less watching. And obviously cute animals. And not AI ones, I hate AI animals so much.
I will say that when I am not logged in I definitely get rage bait, but I don’t know if it tends toward showing that. I think it also shows more progressive stuff if I’m not logged in. But that’s because I’m an anonymous user with no history. It genuinely hopes to keep you watching as long as it can, and it does not benefit its masters if you get mad and turn it off, whether they are themselves uber fascists or not.
I joined TikTok once briefly, became alarmed by getting trapped in cute dog and horse videos for 4 hours, was possibly accidentally shown a video of a cute animal that did not end well, and deleted my account.
I was going to join and post a cute dog video on RedNote. This thread has not convinced me one way or the other if that is a bad idea, but maybe I skimmed it too quickly.
posted by Glinn at 2:43 PM on January 18 [3 favorites]
One easy way to get led down the right-wing radicalization pipeline is to start looking up firearms or new Star Wars trilogy criticism. I think reactionary content inherently has an advantage because it relies on already existing biases and pavlovian associations. To formulate an alternative often requires imagining and conveying a whole different worldview.
White House calls TikTok’s vow to ‘go dark’ without Biden support ‘a stunt’
So, to recap, the Tiktok ban picked up steam during the first Trump presidency (with Facebook pushing heavily behind the scenes) and they threw everything at the wall to see what would stick. I don't think any of the allegations have ever been substantiated, but proponents have basically argued that since it was possible, it must be treated as fact. Tiktok tried to fight it off by offering to comply with whatever requirements the US thought were necessary, but that was dismissed out of hand. The ban passed Congress under the Biden administration, meaning it's now truly a bipartisan effort. Having failed its Supreme Court appeal and faced with the choice of divest or leave, Tiktok is choosing to leave and now Biden is trying to walk it back because the proponents apparently didn't really think that given an ultimatum, Tiktok would actually make the choice and they don't want to take the PR hit. I mean, if you were truly convinced Tiktok was an national security risk that couldn't be mitigated, you would not be looking for a way to avoid enforcing the ban you signed into law. Just a clown show all around.
This case should be viewed as a hostile corporate takeover campaign that hijacked government and media to force a sale through legislation; data privacy, national security, whatever are secondary reasons at best proffered up to get enough wider buy-in to make it happen. One takeaway is that the US market is not as exceptional as it once was - Tiktok would rather keep its data and algorithms and stay out of the US market than sell them. It's also pretty remarkable to me that the ability to influence politics with vast amounts of money is considered a 1st Amendment right, but access to a platform for self-expression is not.
The average American who knows nothing of China except from memes, anecdotes, Youtubers, the occasional headline, etc (which is to say zero personal experience or sympathetic views) has built up a collection of "facts" and images that's pretty removed from daily life and, to be frank, generally ranges from sensationalistic to outright fabricated (e.g. the government tracks everybody by a social credit score to keep them in line!). And there's rarely ever any pushback, so when suddenly exposed to lived, experiential life (street food, fashion, pets, etc, albeit curated and with selection bias) the result is whiplash.
I think apps like Tiktok are the natural endstate of the internet and capitalist atomization. The Peter Thiel Op-Ed is not wrong that legacy media functioned as a gatekeeper by determining what was newsworthy and filtering things at a local level before they became widely propagated. This was mostly a good thing - it stopped noise from being mistaken as signal. His problem is the digital equivalent of seeing the face of Mary Magdalene in a tortilla. Journalists are human but modern news organizations had a code of ethics and cared about their credibility, while the majority of influencers don't. To riff on Abe Lincoln, they don't have to fool everybody all of the time, just some of the people all of the time. Now everything is frictionless - you can connect with like-minded individuals anywhere in the world with a few taps of the finger! - and you're served up a bevy of personalized choices for consumption, so if you want to find a group cherrypicking signs that point to a secret cabal of Satanists running the world because you're missing that communal belonging in your personal life, well, that's now possible.
posted by ndr at 6:25 PM on January 18
White House calls TikTok’s vow to ‘go dark’ without Biden support ‘a stunt’
So, to recap, the Tiktok ban picked up steam during the first Trump presidency (with Facebook pushing heavily behind the scenes) and they threw everything at the wall to see what would stick. I don't think any of the allegations have ever been substantiated, but proponents have basically argued that since it was possible, it must be treated as fact. Tiktok tried to fight it off by offering to comply with whatever requirements the US thought were necessary, but that was dismissed out of hand. The ban passed Congress under the Biden administration, meaning it's now truly a bipartisan effort. Having failed its Supreme Court appeal and faced with the choice of divest or leave, Tiktok is choosing to leave and now Biden is trying to walk it back because the proponents apparently didn't really think that given an ultimatum, Tiktok would actually make the choice and they don't want to take the PR hit. I mean, if you were truly convinced Tiktok was an national security risk that couldn't be mitigated, you would not be looking for a way to avoid enforcing the ban you signed into law. Just a clown show all around.
This case should be viewed as a hostile corporate takeover campaign that hijacked government and media to force a sale through legislation; data privacy, national security, whatever are secondary reasons at best proffered up to get enough wider buy-in to make it happen. One takeaway is that the US market is not as exceptional as it once was - Tiktok would rather keep its data and algorithms and stay out of the US market than sell them. It's also pretty remarkable to me that the ability to influence politics with vast amounts of money is considered a 1st Amendment right, but access to a platform for self-expression is not.
Every American who's like "well, I'll give the Chinese government my data willingly" is definitely not one of Chinese or Taiwanese or Hong Kong descent.Speak for yourself, my family is from Taiwan and they already got all my shit, I've got nothing to lose. I doubt I'll start using it regularly but I did check it out of curiosity.
The average American who knows nothing of China except from memes, anecdotes, Youtubers, the occasional headline, etc (which is to say zero personal experience or sympathetic views) has built up a collection of "facts" and images that's pretty removed from daily life and, to be frank, generally ranges from sensationalistic to outright fabricated (e.g. the government tracks everybody by a social credit score to keep them in line!). And there's rarely ever any pushback, so when suddenly exposed to lived, experiential life (street food, fashion, pets, etc, albeit curated and with selection bias) the result is whiplash.
I think apps like Tiktok are the natural endstate of the internet and capitalist atomization. The Peter Thiel Op-Ed is not wrong that legacy media functioned as a gatekeeper by determining what was newsworthy and filtering things at a local level before they became widely propagated. This was mostly a good thing - it stopped noise from being mistaken as signal. His problem is the digital equivalent of seeing the face of Mary Magdalene in a tortilla. Journalists are human but modern news organizations had a code of ethics and cared about their credibility, while the majority of influencers don't. To riff on Abe Lincoln, they don't have to fool everybody all of the time, just some of the people all of the time. Now everything is frictionless - you can connect with like-minded individuals anywhere in the world with a few taps of the finger! - and you're served up a bevy of personalized choices for consumption, so if you want to find a group cherrypicking signs that point to a secret cabal of Satanists running the world because you're missing that communal belonging in your personal life, well, that's now possible.
posted by ndr at 6:25 PM on January 18
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posted by BungaDunga at 7:23 AM on January 14 [47 favorites]