Any social media that you isn't open and self hostable (Lemmy, Mastodon, etc) should not be used. That includes Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok, and more.
Most social media has, IMHO, been a net-negative for society and I am in the generation that grew up with it in its infancy.
I second this opinion. The federated applications and communities aren't perfect, but it's less toxic and better to use in general due to the lack of an all-encompassing algorithm that guides your usage to increase views for ad revenue.
Reminder: TikTok is not actually important. Everyone can live their lives without TikTok, YouTube, etc. There's an infinite amount of ways to entertain ourselves and there's a lot of competing apps.
This isn't the government abusing its power to shut down some small business/upstart. It's shutting down a serious national security threat and a monopoly. TikTok has abused their position many times in many ways, refused to cooperate, and has reached the, "find out" phase.
Everyone can live their lives without TikTok, YouTube...
I was an adult before YT and I don't want to go back to a time before it existed. It's just too damn useful as a self education tool. Need to learn how to DIY a plumbing problem? Youtube. Need to learn how to subnet a network? Youtube. Interested in the History of Moldova? Youtube.
I finished my basement by watching youtube videos and learning how to do everything from framing to electrical to drywall to finishing work. There isn't anywhere else you can freely get the same breadth of knowledge on-demand.
Yeah, they should shut down both. Honestly, X should be on the chopping block even faster that Meta, but Zuck seems committed to racing Musk to the bottom.
I've never even looked at it. Vine was pretty cool but then it died, Periscope was neat, but I dunno, something about Tiktok feels predatory, how addictive it is (from what I've seen of others using it).
Plus while they're all as bad as each other, I still trust China less than Microsoft with my stuff, so yeah. I'm just not interested in it and don't really see the appeal for myself. But I see why it's popular and it's not like, terrible, as a concept.
That would go beyond the ban’s requirement for app stores to stop offering downloads of the app, but not immediately halt use of it.
Before the tankies get mad about the "censorship" of the US while failing to mention the LONG list of things you can get straight up arrested for in China
When I was able to speak to Ms. Wu about the "tea drinking" session (euphemism for police harassment), she sharply conveyed her sense of vulnerability due to the lack of interest in her stepping away from her popular Twitter account, stating,
Literally the only thing that was keeping me online for the past few years was they were worried it would make China look bad if they cracked down on me. Now that they know that I could be dead in a ditch tomorrow and no one would give a shit or say a word I’m 1000x less safe here.
[...]
Wu added,
After years of doing this without anyone saying anything, on June 30th, out of the blue, they send plainclothes thugs to my house. Surprise! They were real cops.
Why? because she's LGBTQ+, has a Uyghur partner, and has some friends in Western nations.
Is Loops ready for wide scale adoption and federation yet? We kinda need a replacement for tiktok, otherwise the addicts will jump to yet another Chinese platform.
Why let the Chinese get all the eyeballs for propaganda? Surely we should give other nations a chance?
IMHO they should shut down every app that is both popular and has an exceedingly difficult to penetrate monopoly. Let the competitors rush in and do a it again when the same situation occurs!
I have my doubts that any app will collect the user base back together ever again. I may be wrong, but once TikTok is gone, people will splinter to different apps that are nowhere near as popular.
Free speech means the government will let citizens criticise them or communicate other political opinions without sanctions. It does not mean they can't ban one channel of communication when they are worried foreign actors use it to take advantage of the citizens. There are plenty other channels through which the citizens can communicate their opinions.
It's a .ml tankie, they only care because it's a Chinese company, guaranteed if it was like a UK company or something they wouldn't say a word about it lmao
I'm honestly surprised more content creators on TikTok haven't raised a stink about this from what I've seen. Agree with it or not, for some people this is their livelihood.
IIRC TikTok is rather top heavy in terms of income and this highest tier of influencers is diversified across all media channels anyway.
Regular folk have better luck making money on YouTube and Instagram so TikTok creators are unusual bunch. In my experience (which is very likely shaped by the algorithm) they are a mix of talent show performers, odd personalities and no longer relevant one hit wonders that got lucky. They’re mostly sad about losing that space because it’s so different to alternatives. I don’t think anyone that doesn’t have much money feels in power anymore so what are they going to do?