It is not about the data. It’s about a foreign government controlling the algorithm that decides what millions of people see, and their ability to shape public opinion through that.
Like imagine if China owned CNN and the New York Times and decided what stories they could publish.
> Like imagine if China owned CNN and the New York Times and decided what stories they could publish.
It is happening on our local platforms here. Meta, based in the US, is systematically censoring Palestinian content that would otherwise be available here in Canada.
While one is certainly entitled to disagree with Meta's moderation policies, I feel like this muddies the issue.
Specifically what happened in Canada is:
* A national security review found Tiktok's operations in Canada to be a risk to national security
* Tiktok's operations in Canada are being closed down but Canadians are still able to use and post on Tiktok
* This type of review is pretty opaque by nature so more details are probably unavailable at this stage
If Canadians are still able to use and post on Tiktok I'm not sure there is a speech/censorship issue here. Maybe Tiktok Canada was harboring spies or something, or maybe this is a roundabout way to push Tiktok out of the country later, but I don't think we have any solid public info.
> If Canadians are still able to use and post on Tiktok I'm not sure there is a speech/censorship issue here. Maybe Tiktok Canada was harboring spies or something,
If tiktok is allowed to do business in the country, then they can buy allegiance via the creator fund which makes it harder to get citizens to realize (and leave it) once they start deploying active measures.
Which gives us a cyclical problem. Do they share those views because American media has so much influence in Canada? Or does American media have influence in Canada because they Americans and Canadians have shared views?
Neighbors in Asia and Europe often have completely unaligned political politics due to a language and media barrier. Even the US and everything south of Texas don't align as much as the US and Canada.
No. US and Canada share a language and have historically intermingled their populations significantly. We're the same because we have largely similar daily lives as individuals, we have similar problems, and we're populated by people of similar origins. If, for example, conditions caused our paths to diverge, an extreme example would be the split between East and West Germany, then you would expect differing views. Even prior to modern media we were very similar peoples.
some amount of censorship is unavoidable. when nation state A is in control of the censorship, and designs that censorship to intentionally hurt nation state B, then nation state B has every right to ban the platform that nation state A is using to push it's agenda.
Censorship is fascism. If you want bad ideas to die, let them be examined and discussion to proceed. When you censor ideas you don't like, you give them a safe environment to foster.
What matters is the people of the nation state, and censorship by their own government depriving them of information is absolutely hurting them. Government only censors people when uncensored information would cause their interests to conflict with those of the people in power.
No information is being deprived, you can read up all you want in more detail than in TikTok. Rather it's the argument to lazily consume 2 minute bites as a replacement for in-depth study.
youre ignoring my point to such a degree that it seems intentional. ill have to assume that you either work for a nation state, or you have a third grade education level.
I actually replied to someone else, not you. I'm not aware of any point you have because I haven't read anything you've posted. Given your attitude here, it seems like that's for the best. Perhaps you meant to reply to someone else, too?
No it doesn't. When the citizens of nation state B have the right to freedom of speech and freedom to consume foreign-controlled media, then nation state B does not have the rights you outlined over its people.
IIRC similar polling in the US led to similar results so the claim is not wrong even if the implication was likely that the majority of Americans support Israel.
a non-zero amount of censorship is unavoidable in a social media platform. when nation state A is in control of the censorship of social media platform Z, and designs the censorship of that platform to intentionally hurt nation state B by causing division amongst the citizens of nation state B, then nation state B has every right to ban social media platform Z.
>designs the censorship of that platform to intentionally hurt nation state B by causing division amongst the citizens of nation state B
If the division is a result of the platform exposing people in that nation to information that they previously didn't have access to, due to the government censoring it, then it's absolutely a good thing for the people of the nation. The government of the nation state can get fucked when its interests go against the interests of its people. A divided people is a much better thing than a people united by ignorance and belief in falsehood.
but thats not what nation state A is doing - differing amounts of information is selectively made available to different groups of citizens in nation state B, purely to sow discord when those two groups of citizens interact.
But it doesn't matter what the intent is. The intent behind many types of publishing and media can be malicious. The ability to publish that media and the ability of Americans to consume that media is protected free speech
For sure US companies do it too. But from a _national security perspective_ the US/Canada don’t care about local companies as much as foreign companies _controlled by a foreign (and in this case hostile) government_.
Being openly sympathetic to the ongoing genocide of Palestinians is bad, so if your rule is being followed, we should expect to see an equally low amount of information from both sides of the conflict: the Israeli side and the Palestinian side.
Your opponent justified himself that TikTok ban was necessary- he looked some antisemitic videos, and this is it, he promotes terrorism and antisemitism, totally falling under propaganda.
Sure, just like there is no terrorism in the middle east. We said it, so that makes it true.
Honestly though, I believe the rising islamophobia and anti-Palestinian attitudes owe to the proliferation of such content online. There is simply no denying an extremely disproportionate amount of hate speech and misinformation coming from the pro-Israel movement, backed by Israel and Israeli media, and directed towards Palestinians and those who oppose the genocide of them. I say this as a jewish person.
I'm just suggesting we remove the noise surrounding the conflict, by curbing the systemic spread of non-truths and hate speech by Israeli-backed disinformation campaigns. Just scroll through any social network or news post with comments. For every one mild post you see describing Israel's genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and The West Bank, you will find ten extremely islamophobic comments directed towards Palestinians who had nothing to do with the conflict.
If you are interested in discussion, I encourage you to post good faith replies, instead of calling people who don't agree with you, "trolls", an old and tired routine of internet trolls dating back decades.
What exactly do you take issue with? Your naked and hurtful assertions not being taken on blind faith? The fact that I, a person of jewish faith, see significantly less hate directed at me for it, than I do directed towards Palestinians and those who oppose the genocide of them?
Expecting Facebook or Google to pay publishers is like going back in time to 1970 and saying that a newsstand should be paying newspaper publishers for the privilege of selling their papers.
What’s crazy is few people even talk about who currently owns major US news networks and what their motives might be. People don’t like Musk owning Twitter/X, that’s a start - but start reading about who owns the rest (especially traditional media).
To be fair, as it relates to this topic there isn't really a need to discuss because foreign entities have been banned from owning controlling stakes in TV and radio networks without approval. A Chinese organization would never be allowed to control a news network in the way they control TikTok.
But the news networks are on the way out, and tiktoks are in. Do you remember the joyous declarations from 1990s that meatspace state borders do not apply to cyberspace? That was not entirely wishful thinking. The same properties that allow information from "free world" to make way into the "world of oppression" work for different definitions of "free" (democratic, communist, fundamentalist, etc) and "oppressed" (communist brainwashed, capitalist exploitative, sinful and godless, etc). A very similar situation enmeshes cryptography.
> What’s crazy is few people even talk about who currently owns major US news networks and what their motives might be.
People talk about Rupert Murdock and Jeff Bezos all the time. Who else do you feel we should talk about? There is that one conservative owner of most radio stations in the US.
> People don’t like Musk owning Twitter/X, that’s a start
After Elon took over, he deleted my Twitter account. Still not sure why, but it happened around the time reporters who retweeted #Elonjet had their accounts deleted. And I did retweet it.
Media consolidation is an issue, but Musk with Twitter is so petty, racist, and blatantly self serving. I refuse to be associated with it.
> but start reading about who owns the rest (especially traditional media).
traditional media != social media. The potential for manipulation is much greater with social media.
> It is not about the data. It’s about a foreign government controlling the algorithm that decides what millions of people see, and their ability to shape public opinion through that.
Well, this is Canada we are talking about. All of the countries in OP's list are foreign.
As a Canadian, the US already controls Canada in almost every way. We get US media, technology, gas, trade, etc. If the US wanted Canada to do something, they wouldn't have to use subtle techniques to do it, they could just demand it.
I don't think the US tries to control Canada like a vassal. It's an unfair portrayal of their common history. Canada is basically the parts of British interest in North America that that revolutionary war failed to reach or aquire in post war negotiations. Benedict Arnold, following Washingtons plan, was defeated in Quebec after all. The US influences Canada more than Canada influences the US because its population is 10x. If the situation were reversed and Canada had all the northern states of the US their relationship would be the same.
This sounds reasonable but I feel just like OP, its still missing the forest from the trees
Its not about who has the data, although that is important.
Its not about subversion of a population by a foreign state, although that is important too.
The crux of the issue is reciprocity.
China does not let any CAN or US companies into China markets, without first demanding local factories, forcing local production, requiring equity control and even IP. And if you dont share it, bohoo they will steal it anyway. And, there's no recourse.
The chinese govt has abused free trade for so long. Its time to demand fairness.
They dont give us access into their markets? OK! We close our markets to their corporations.
What are you talking about? You can import stuff to China right now, most stuff import tax is 10%, much lower than USA's tariff on Chinese goods at 25%. Apple has been selling made in India iphone in China, Nike selling made in Vietnam shoes in China. Apple, Tesla have very large market share in China. Intel, Microsoft, Cisco, Oracle, Amazon sell software, networking equipment, Cloud computing, databases, the stuff that is security sensitive to China and Chinese government. Where is the reciprocal access for Chinese companies to US market? Can BYD, Huawei sell to US? Can companies like Wuxi apptec, CATL, Gotion, DJI do business with US partners without absurd political witch hunting, discrimination, bans, sanctions? Mind you these companies are wanted by US companies, and they hire American workers with American offices. Tiktok pays a lot to US employees right? China also hosted a lot of trade shows year around and American companies can freely participate in them, sell and importing stuff to China. Where is the non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese firms? China imported $2.8 trillion of goods in 2023, 2nd highest in the world, China has 0% tariffs with many countries as part of free trade agreement, what is this? Isn't this not market access? What are you talking about. Apple, Tesla, Nike, GE, cisco all get non-biased if not halo marketing in China. Please proof where Chinese government is attacking them like US government is attacking Huawei, Wuxi apptec, DJI, and huge number of Chinese companies too long to list.
> Like imagine if China owned CNN and the New York Times and decided what stories they could publish
Okay. Now imagine CNN and NYTimes and Fox News being coerced into publishing or not publishing info because a US gov agency demands it. Or how about the US gov pressuring Meta and Twitter to change their algos around very specific topics? You don't need to imagine it actually.
So why is that less of a concern than China controlling a media delivery service?
>>> So why is that less of a concern than China controlling a media delivery service?
>> US Government likes US Government control because it's themselves.
> I know. That doesn't tell me why China controlling a social media algorithm is inherently any worse from yours or my perspective.
Why is it less of a concern to you if you control your bank account than if I do?
If we're not making obvious distinctions today, you should give me your bank account credentials, since we're all the same.
>> They don't want an adversary to have control.
> Is the "adversary" claim not undermined by them being a primary trade partner?
It is not. I have difficulty imagining your question is not founded on feigned ignorance.
China is an adversary of the US. Some optimistic and naive Western politicians in the 90s thought making them a "primary trade partner" would cause political changes that would eliminate the rivalry. They were wrong, and weakened their countries in the process. That's been clear for like ten years. Now their mistake needs to be dealt with.
You haven't made a point that I can see! I'm actually being genuine here, I don't know where this went off the rails for you exactly, but I would like my questions to be answered.
I'll just copypaste what I said in another thread to be as direct as possible:
I am being told that it's a "concern" but without an explanation. What are the material, concrete harms that can come from China directing the content algo?
I made a pretty simple and straightforward analogy, which you didn't get. Maybe you don't get the geopolitical relevance of media control, but I'd really hope you'd understand bank account control. You = the US polity, Me = China, Bank account = something an adversary could harm you by controlling.
> I'm actually being genuine here...but I would like my questions to be answered....
> I am being told that it's a "concern" but without an explanation. What are the material, concrete harms that can come from China directing the content algo?
If you're being truthful, I think you might be at the point where you have to do some basic reading first, because you seem to need more hand-holding and explanation than it's reasonable to expect. You may also have some conceptual deficits that are so basic they come off as feigned.
> I think you might be at the point where you have to do some basic reading first
You are making the claim, you should be able to back the claim up. You're actually writing very many words to avoid a direct explanation, which is even more confusing.
I wonder if once any post goes up that is relevant China's interests, an email goes out from some department in the CCP govt, then hordes of Chinese advocates descend on the comments section, arguing, diverting, obsfucating, and muddying the waters so much that no sensible conclusion can ever be made.
The harms are so obvious I am wondering why I am even discussing it.
Obviously giving your primary geo-strategic competitor (with a history of propaganda) access at massive scale to shape opinion, promote discord, polarisation etc etc in the next generation of youth is a bad thing.
Not to mention the harvesting of personal data at massive scale and who knows how that might be used in the context of an AI-driven future.
You'd have to be ridiculously naive not to see that.
> to shape opinion, promote discord, polarisation etc etc in the next generation of youth is a bad thing
I remain unconvinced that people aren't shaping their own opinions by continuing to pursue similar content to what they typically agree with already. And as we all know, at this current time TikTok's algo is indistinguishable from US competitors in the obvious way it buckets people into like-minded feeds + comments.
At minimum we should be consistent in what we claim is the bad behavior. If the algo is really the problem, start regulating all of them and do it now. To do otherwise is hypocrisy.
> who knows how that might be used in the context of an AI-driven future
I'm not sure we want to legislate and set rules based on a "who knows". If the outcome is bad you need to define that bad outcome.
"I remain unconvinced that people aren't shaping their own opinions by continuing to pursue similar content to what they typically agree with already. And as we all know, at this current time TikTok's algo is indistinguishable from US competitors in the obvious way it buckets people into like-minded feeds + comments..."
You have not the slightest clue whether this is true or not.
Why does China block all foreign social media access within its own borders?
Wouldnt it be wonderful if we in the West could advocate for our own interests inside China the way the Chinese can participate in our conversations.
trade partner does not exclude adversary. Look at US-Japan trade in the 30s up until just before WW2 when the US decision to embargo exports to Japan (to try to force Japan to stop its occupation of China) led to WW2. It was a pretty quick flip from major trading partner to war.
It's less of a concern because it hasn't happened, and -- assuming Trump doesn't "suspend the constitution" -- can't constitutionally happen. If it does happen, then yes, I will be incredibly concerned about it, more than whatever China is doing.
But right now, today, we have a media delivery service, controlled by China, that millions of Americans use. That's a real, present concern.
Since it's a hot button conspiracy theorist topic, I need to preface that I don't actually care about the Hunter Biden laptop drama nor the contents of the laptop, but Twitter and Meta actually were told to suppress sharing and discussion of the topic, and they followed orders. It happened. And that's just a recent time that we happen to know about.
> But right now, today, we have a media delivery service, controlled by China, that millions of Americans use. That's a real, present concern.
Again, I am being told that it's a "concern" but without an explanation. What are the material, concrete harms that can come from China directing the content algo?
Yeah, that's kinda how all social media algos work. You get bucketed in with the content you engage with and watch the most ie the stuff you likely (but not necessarily!) agree with the most already. It's almost as if TikTok's algo isn't any different than FB or IG or X.
I don't see how a foreign government or any foreign interest is worse than domestic interests (or governments).
The us is already one of the most propagandized nations on earth and our own government only benefits from this, despite ostensibly being criticized from sanitized angles.
I don't know what life is like in canada, but what i surmise from friends is that the experience is similar.
Ok, but none of the domestic interests are (theoretically) controlled by the government and yet all are (evidently) at least as malicious.
I suppose this would be easier to rationalize if domestic interests were democratically controllable.... but they're not. And they certainly aren't by canadians, which makes this action doubly confusing.
Nonetheless, this underlines the hypocrisy of punishing TikTok but not western corporations. By any standard (except for foreign control, which is of dubious merit when domestic control is equally harmful) Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc are equally of deserving of restriction as TikTok is.
As opposed to the domestic government controlling the algorithm that decides what millions of people see, and their ability to shape public opinion through that.
If you live in a democracy you have a vote and a voice to bring to the table. It’s wild to me that on this topic people seem to see their own governments as largely equivalent to an outwardly adversarial if not explicitly hostile foreign power.
I think it has been so long since the Pax-Americana West has dealt with an overtly hostile major power that we’ve collectively lost the concept that there can be real enemies with goals that run explicitly counter to our own.
"It’s wild to me that on this topic people seem to see their own governments as largely equivalent to an outwardly adversarial if not explicitly hostile foreign power".
Because governments are adversarial to their general population in many cases. People live in reality, not in imagination land where the salt-of-the-earth type of people's voices are at all considered.
It is a frustrating and often ineffectual system, but I simply cannot disagree more that I, as an American citizen, have equivalent powerlessness over the American government as I do over the Chinese government. There is a clear and storied history of people who cared about issues making real change to the American government and the lives of their fellow citizens. There are plenty of terrible things this country has done as well, but I’m not ready to give up on it yet and assume the Chinese government is equivalent.
Support for Israel reflects the broad support in the American public. You'll find that elected officials generally reflect the opinions of those that voted for them. They likely disagree with your opinions and think Israel is right to use force to defend itself against the aggression of its enemies.
That said these sorts of issues were way down the list in these elections and people have to compromise on some issues and vote on the aggregate. I do think that it's pretty clear the Republicans were and are a lot more understanding and publicly supportive of Israel vs. the Democrats. They didn't try to do a "both sides here" but clearly communicated who they consider to be the aggressor and who they consider to be defending themselves. That doesn't mean that every single republican voter feels that way but a lot of them do.
The US also supported and brokered quite a few peace initiatives in the middle east. It's not fair to say it only acts to support wars.
> You'll find that elected officials generally reflect the opinions of those that voted for them.
If you look into the data, you'll generally find that they don't.
"Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organised groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence."
This doesn't exactly contradict what I was saying. Just because elected officials hold similar opinions doesn't mean economic interests can't impact their policy decisions. Also in terms of methodology, skimming through the paper, the author uses "national survey of the general public" but my claim is whether a given official reflects the will of their voters - which is not the same thing. He does also look at what "affluent" people think as some sort of proxy for the power of money. Maybe there's something there.
I think it's an interesting area of research. However on many fundamental issues, let's say illegal immigration, foreign policy, or abortions, it's not immediately obvious that business interests hold power most of the time. If that was true then it really wouldn't matter if you have democrats or republicans in power but you see definite shift in policy when that happens.
It only serves to support wars, and most of the American public has historically been fine with it as long as the conflicts aren't on their own soil. However, they can no longer have that sense of security under Trump.
> For example, a vote for anyone is always a vote Israel and Israel's apartheid and wars.
This is provably false. The Green Party explicitly ran on support for Palestine and voters in parts of Michigan voted for the party in decently large numbers to split the Democrat vote.
Not enough voters saw the issue as big enough to switch their votes on a national scale but that’s not a failure of lack of choice, the people spoke with their votes that they don’t care about Israel and Palestine nearly as much as other issues.
I have plenty of beef with the American political system, but a loud group of motivated Americans absolutely has the ability to influence government decisions. If you, a citizen, decided you really cared about something, and gathered your like-minded fellow citizens to amplify your voice, you have a real chance at making an impact. That cannot be said in any way, shape, or form for a foreign power.
Lots of things change in China because people make a big stink about it. Probably the most notable are the lockdown protests, but there are countless examples of someone complaining about bad local governance and the national government coming in to fix it.
Chinese social media is pretty vibrant with the exception that you can’t agitate for the fall of the government.
> Chinese social media is pretty vibrant with the exception that you can’t agitate for the fall of the government.
Just because one criticizes or expresses anger at the central government does not mean that they want to induce mobs that will topple it like in Ukraine. I sincerely doubt China's future history books will talk about the Pooh Bear mobs that brought down Xi's government. More likely to complain about housing or jobs.
But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about the possibility that Americans can change the policies and actions of the US government, vs. the possibility that Americans can change the policies and actions of the Chinese government. (Chinese citizens' ability to change the policies and actions of the Chinese government is irrelevant.)
The fact of the matter is that Americans do have the ability to change the policies and actions of the US government. It's hard to do, requires collective action, and can fail, but it's possible, and there are quite a few example of it happening.
No American can do anything at all, ever, about whatever the Chinese government has decided to do.
That makes sense for Chinese citizens, but I was talking as a foreign citizen, since we were discussing the differences between having your own government vs a foreign government involved in what content you see.
Making a whole generation unfit for qualified work is a serious threat for every nation.
Many of the Tiktok generation live in a world where reading for 3 minutes is a heavy effort they are unwilling to do. All information is supposed to be presented in short entertaining video clips.
In China online time for the youth has been strictly regulated years ago. But harming other nations is only in their interest.
The clearest way to look at this is through the lens of Althusser's Ideological State Apparatus(ISK). Media is one of the arms of the ISK. It's not necessarily that TikTok is foreign owned, it's that China's dominant ideology is incompatible with the western hegemony. The western ISK sees alternative ideologies as a threat and control over the arm of mass media is a concrete form of that threat. The ISK must have control over dominant forms of media in order to maintain ideological hegemony.
Actually, there is a lot more. About 30% people (of USA) use TT, ~60% under 30. You guess it, they don't to look only at dance videos. Social media had become a huge source of information for a big chunk of the population.
On TT, and on most social media (SM), what you watch is mainly determined by the recommendation algorithm. This algo can hide subjects the SM can't put ad on but also subjects the they don't like and boost the one they do (shadow ban). That how you politicize SM. That about, the first thing Musk did with Twitter (after firing people).
When it's a state controlled SM, it's more like foreign interference. There is a lot of books about that. It's documented, not a secret of something. Uyghurs for example, have been a subject of ban on TikTok, shadowing it heavily.
But it's not foreign interference, it's foreign media. Foreign media is permissible for Americans to choose to consume and guess what, young people lap it up. That's their right
It could have been if ByteDance wasn't totally state controlled. Also, since TikTok is banned on China, it's not like it exists in China as a media (the Chinese version is called Douyin and basically it's the same as TikTok but with contents from within China only, to not interfere with the Great Firewall).
Also, the concept of "choose to consume" is blurring with algorithm recommendation and optimizing dopamine reward to maximize screen time.
The CCP didn't control of ByteDance to interference with other countries but to be able to control what happens inside China. But now, it's different.
But none of that changes the fact that Americans have the right to consume foreign controlled media. Totally state controlled media is legal to consume and spread and even become super popular in the US. I really dislike the idea that if some content is popular in the US and the government thinks the content is bad, they can just ban it. "Algorithmic manipulation" is a red herring. If people like it, they can watch it. If they don't they don't have to. Doesn't matter who makes it or for what reason
I think I understand your point. Actually, it's a good point.I may have missed it before.
Nobody said that consuming foreign controlled media is prohibited. And banning TT isn't about that. It's about Foreigner Interference.
You said that it's foreigner media not interference. The difference is that media are verifiable and can be checked by anybody and everybody has the same information. That is not the case for social media.
The problem is for another country to be able to do mass manipulation. Like the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica manipulation scandal, where they push some "ideas" to a very specific population because the data they collected show that you will act or think in a certain way. Since when you consume media you don't know they do it AND nobody can prove they do it, it's now manipulative and so interference (can also be done over a long period, such as several months or years, to gradually modify your point of view and be less detectable).
If there was a message saying “We recommend this video because we think you'll react like XXX”, I might consider that ethical (there are other problems too, but that's a theoretical example).
You might say that people in the US (or any other country) still have the right to consume foreign-controlled social media because they know they can be manipulated. Even if I agree, I think it's normal that the state make it difficult to do so. I won't blame people who use opium but I will definitively blame the USA people (or state from any country, here it's USA) for facilitating opium use.
You might say also that the manipulation can be from within the USA (like with Cambridge Analytica), it's true. That is definitively a good point. And to defend the ban of TT, I will say that I don't have a perfect solution. I don't like the ban of TT either, but it was necessary because of the risk of mass manipulation. We have to come up with a better solution (that we don't have now). Because it may happen soon on X or Youtube and we can't ban every social media we suspect will do mass manipulation on the sly.
I hope you get my point because I think that is necessary for us to do so to come up with a better solution. One that will integrate your POV because it's entirely justifiable.
> The difference is that media are verifiable and can be checked by anybody and everybody has the same information. That is not the case for social media.
They can both be checked by everyone and verified. Just like any kind of social media, even Tweets that get quickly deleted by the creators, they still persist online and get analyzed and debated. Traditional media can also take down articles and videos quickly. I don't see the difference, and don't believe there is a legal difference.
> where they push some "ideas" to a very specific population because the data they collected show that you will act or think in a certain way
This is allowed, and attempts by the government to disallow it are against free speech. If a country has several state owned TV channels with differing views, and it advertises them online selectively using a platform like Facebook which connects the different channels to different likely to click audiences, and it's doing so with malicious intent, then thats basically another form of what you call "interference" but it's Americans' right to consume whatever media they want however they came across it.
Again, the intent of the publishers does not matter. The intent of the editors does not matter. Once we agree the government can ban media platforms because of what they push, free speech is seriously eroded.
> gradually modify your point of view and be less detectable
The trick is that you are saying "modify ones point of view" and pretending that it isn't the right of an American to form whatever view they want from whatever content they want. All content is designed to modify your view. Adding new information to your life will modify your view of the world. You are just using a feature of content to argue it should be banned.
> I think it's normal that the state make it difficult to do so. I won't blame people who use opium but I will definitively blame the USA people (or state from any country, here it's USA) for facilitating opium use
But content is not opium, and free speech is sacrosanct because it is the only lever to allow a free society. When you restrict content because you disapprove of the speaker or the message, you create a world where free speech dies. Banning opium doesn't have those consequences.
> I hope you get my point because I think that is necessary for us to do so to come up with a better solution.
I get your point, but I am fundamentally against anything whose goal is to avoid "mass manipulation" that is essentially saying we should ban things that get popular which we don't like. And that's not for the government to decide for me or anyone else. Thanks for hearing me out though. I appreciate that
> They can both be checked by everyone and verified.
No, that not what I mean. What you can't check is that they push something to someone specifically to make that person react in a certain way. That is not verifiable.
Regardless of whether the content is true or false (that doesn't matter actually, or should I say it's less important whether it's true or not, obviously fake news are a problem but less important than that).
> Adding new information to your life will modify your view of the world.
Yes. And you should be able to choose what you add to your life, what you watch freely.
Not a recommended algorithm that nobody understand how it works.
> You are just using a feature of content to argue it should be banned.
I'm sorry ? I don't understand what you are saying here. I read it many times, but I just don't understand what you mean.
> But content is not opium
It's debatable. Nearly 100% of TikTok traffic is recommended (it's an estimation) and as or some years ago(2015 ?), about 70% of Youtube was recommended (given by youtube). That mean people do not expressly choose what they watch and particularly, most of the traffic is compulsive. But it's debatable, you are right "content is not opium" but sometime it's consumed as if it were so how to deal with it ?
> and free speech is sacrosanct
Once again, yes. It's not about the content that is on TikTok, sorry if didn't make it clear. It's not about free speech. You can still say what ever you want. It's again too much power of TikTok.
> I am fundamentally against anything whose goal is to avoid "mass manipulation" that is essentially saying we should ban things that get popular which we don't like
That absolutely NOT my point. Effectively, my point promote to be against "mass manipulation" but absolutely not "we should ban things that get popular which we don't like". Remember that I also regret the ban. I think it was justified but I don't think it's a solution.
As a French, I learn early in life « Je ne suis pas d’accord avec ce que vous dites, mais je me battrai jusqu’au bout pour que vous puissiez le dire. ». Which can be translated "I don't agree with what you say, but I'll fight for you to be able to say it.".
We both agree on that and as I learned, our definitions of free speech are slightly different but the differences are not relevant here I think.
For example and to finish, a "not so good solution" but something that could have been done to not ban TT is to switch the recommendation algorithm to the one of (the old) Twitter (or the current one of Mastodon), where people could have followers and tweets were shown on a timeline from they followers.
Now, I will again take twitter as example. The fact that Twitter (the new one, X) have an Open-source recommendation algorithm make it not ban-able for example.
Not really, twitter/the-algorithm isn't up-to-date and the models must be shared along with the source code but it's an example. What I say is twitter doesn't have a lot to do to make it any ban unjustified, If someone say "there is too much power from the platform (twitter) and there is manipulation from it", Twitter just have to update the source code (and the models) and it's verifiable (with hard work, but not impossible). That the algorithm is biased is not the point, you have the right to consult media you know the algorithm is biased. The point is that the algorithm must be verifiable.
Thank you for the debate. If I don't respond quickly enough, please send me an e-mail at "ache-hn at ache.one".
For example, islamistic propaganda. It's a serious problem, at least here in Europe. You literally see 10-year-olds watching videos of beheadings in the subway.
Oh, and I wouldn't say that FB is much better. The EU should probably ban both.
TikTok is packed full of political propaganda. Controlling which narratives people think are popular is super powerful. It’s called manufacturing consent.
'Government' can't care. It's just an agreed upon idea, not a thing with feelings. It is a form of anthropomorphising to say it cares. 'Government' is the idea of a structure that many people believe and act as if it is true. This belief and consequent effort by so many allows it to take a material expression in our lives. Like a group of software engineers might envisage a game or solution, so for government - except way more people are involved. Neither government nor software cares though - they're not that type.
Well, yeah actually. If anyone is going to control it, it's best to be us controlling our own messaging.
As a citizen of a country, as much as I would love to believe in free exchange of information, it's better to limit what enemies are able to broadcast directly to our phones. that's a commons with a lot of tragedies in it.
This sounds good in theory but as a Canadian I often wonder how much our government's actions are on behalf of us the people as opposed to well financed or politically powerful special interests. It looks to me like many Canadians other are wondering that as well.
However, that said, I do agree with your broader point. I'm suspicious of Tik Tok and the Chinese government's intentions and I think banning it was a good move.
I am afraid that banning tiktok would make facebook a monopoly in this area.
And facebook has a long story of disregarding privacy, mental health and rights of their users.
Facebook/youtube imposes enough censorship, more than any democratic government can possibly ask for, without looking too weird to the voters. So, gov does not see the reason to regulate, if platforms already proactively implemented all their most wild dreams.
From a Canadian perspective, the CBC should have a social media equivalent that is publicly run, and all social media companies should be regulated under the CRTC
My gut reaction, also as a Canadian, is quite negative to this idea. Are you interested in expanding on the idea? I'm always looking for new perspectives and to understand how my fellow Canadians are looking at issues like this.
If you're pro C-11, you really don't realize how bad this would be to give the government to determine what is "hate speech" and command companies to take it down.
The difficulty here is that it has long been US policy to promote the exports of its intellectual property (such as its movies) and communications networks (such as the internet). Trade policy is almost always a two way street, particularly in the modern era in which arrangements like the "unequal treaties" that choked the Qing dynasty are highly unusual. So banning Tiktok necessarily results in reciprocal bans. Canada does not have similar concerns as the US does because it is our little gas station whose pretensions to independence we humor and they do not export IP or communications technologies at the same scale as we do.
American social networks are already banned in China and have been for a long time. Even TikTok doesn't operate in China because they have a different message they want for their own citizens. Douyin - the Chinese version of Tiktok - promotes learning about science and technology, shuts down at night, and limits how much children are allowed to use it.
Maybe there's child accounts that has those limits, but normal accounts don't match that description. I've watched my girlfriend use Douyin and the content was lower brow than what e.g. Instagram shows her. It was mostly dumb skits and people doing silly dances. Due to time zones, I have no clue if it shut down at night, but it never seemed to be an issue.
We get a lot of propaganda about Chinese social media apps that's just wrong. I was told Xiaohongshu is a propaganda app that sends quotes from Mao's little red book, and it's Chinese Instagram.
It’s your people who decide to see it, not a foreign govt. Chinese media like cnn and nyt exist, no need to imagine either that or the situation where China buys cnn and nyt and gosh now you have to watch their propaganda.
The essence is, by denying agency of your country’s users, you deny the whole set of ideas it bases on. If that’s a natural vulnerability of the ideology, addressing it by banning media is a patch over a bleeding wound.
Canadian teens will simply learn about VPN, like they always do in other countries which ban internet resources. Not a single one of them will leave tiktok.
But it's manipulation by showing Americans stuff other Americans are saying. If Americans want to see that, they can. If they didn't want to, it wouldn't be popular. And why is the government allowed to restrict popular narrative sharing between Americans?
"But it's manipulation by showing Americans stuff other Americans are saying. "
I do not consume TikTok, but I believe it works international?
Also I don't see the point, because there are americans saying, we should be friends with communist china and become like them. By giving those ideas more room - whenever they want, they can shape the discourse. Shape what people think what the majority thinks.
(Most don't actually think much themself, but try to figure out, how to think like the group - they are the targets and their vote counts the same)
> Also I don't see the point, because there are americans saying, we should be friends with communist china and become like them. By giving those ideas more room - whenever they want, they can shape the discourse.
That's called free speech. Horrible, terrible ideas are given room, and we trust people to figure it out. Hell, many many Americans became vaccine skeptics because they were drawn into RFK talking points. That's dangerous too, but free speech is more important than forcing everyone to be good or have good, safe opinions
No, free speech is when everyone in the same room has the same right to speak.
This is creating the illusion of a free speech, where people think they can listen to the other opinions, but in reality they only get to see a distorted part of it. But if you like that, I won't support banning that.
Free speech by your definition does not exist anywhere. The editors of New York Times, CNN etc do not have the "same" right to speak as an average citizen. So the free speech you have experienced so far is nothing more than an illusion.
Nobody has the full view of reality. It's always projected through a lens colored by feelings, emotions, upbringing, education, environment etc. When you hate something, it's not always because have a fully rational motive to hate, but often the things your have experienced, you have read and heard, leads you into that trajectory without you even realizing it. Same goes for love. You hate TikTok and millions of your fellow Americans love TikTok, does that mean you are in a higher position of enlightenment and more holistic view of the universe? I don't think so.
It's also pure nonsense that TikTok is somehow "misleading" the American youth. It's basically a recommendation engine. And what's the job of a recommendation engine? To give you whatever content you might be interested in. Just go to youtube and start clicking all the garbage content (if they are not censored already), you will end up with a lot of garbage in your feed. Because if you spend a lot of time watching garbage, the algorithm will think you like garbage and will push garbage onto your frontpage.
But what you are describing is basically a magazine. There are editors who decide what is and isn't published. It's still free speech to be able to edit and publish a magazine full of whatever you want, and to present it as providing diverse opinions even if it does not
It is - and I think if the Chinese government would have a magazine with the same dominant market position amd reach, we would have the same discussion.
No, we wouldn't. In America, foreign-controlled news and media are allowed to be consumed by the public. It's a fundamental aspect of the right to free speech
I think you're misreading my comment. I find the threat real and probably already in action. My key point is that hard-banning a popular resource in a country without a DPI-like firewall is just a national security theater with no effect.
Take an example from Russia - instead of banning youtube, they just make it crawl and stutter, so fully controlled rutube/dzen/etc start to seem more viable, but it's not too bad to decide to go full VPN. Non-technical people don't even realize that it happens and write it off as some youtube-related network issues.
Of course that is an awful attack on freedom, but you can get real or get rekt.
Sure, so ban when they change the algorithm.
But for some political powers even a current algorithm is a threat, because they cannot control it (like they could do with the local media).
They could request an audit (and ban if tiktok refuses). They could monitor the results they are getting in the recommendations based on specific list of criteria. They could propose moderation rules tiktok would have to follow (kinda similar to how it operates in China - they have a different algorithm there). They could request tiktok servers to be in Canada.
It's about the western gov'ts NOT being able to control the feed, what evidence is there that Chinese gov't is actively involved in curating the TikTok feed?
> It’s about a foreign government controlling the algorithm
The right way to stop bad behavior is to write a specific description of the bad actions and the penalty for doing them into the code of law. The wrong way is to declare specific entities guilty of bad behavior you can only vaguely describe.
There is a very good reason the US constitution bans bills of attainder: they become a way of going after individuals for reasons that if properly articulated could not withstand public scrutiny. Canada would do well to uphold the same taboo.
Note that I'm not registering a position on TikTok itself. It could be run by turbosatan for all I care. I object to the lawless mechanism through which western governments are trying to go after TikTok in particular.
>It’s about a foreign government controlling the algorithm that decides what millions of people see, and their ability to shape public opinion through that.
Adam Curry opined that this was the excuse and it's really about protecting domestic (or at least Western in the case of Canada) social media companies. Seems plausible.
I don't use TikTok so I'm not sure what the feed looks like, but it seems like a bunch of people doing silly stuff and mugging for the camera.
Data protection regulation addresses the abuses of reading information from databases.
An analog to address the abuses of controlling how users read information from databases would be anti-trust regulation that unbundles client software from hosted services. "The algorithm" should be under control of the client software, for which there should be a competitive market, based on well-documented APIs for communication between the two. Then everyone can choose what "algorithm" they want, rather than having one singular one pushed on them by the service provider abusing its captive audience.
But foreign news media are legal for people to consume in the US, at least. If every American wanted to read and watch Al Jazeera and put it on in every store and bar and restaurant, that wouldn't justify banning it
Canadian users can still access Tiktok and are still subject to Tiktok's algorithms. They're also still subject to Meta's algorithms that, unlike Tiktok, have already helped cause at least one genocide[1].
Tiktok's Canada-based offices must have been up to some other form of skulduggery for them to have been shuttered while leaving Canadian use of the platform completely status quo.
I tried TikTok out earlier this year. It was enjoyable but at least once a day when I was using the app heavily I would be served a video that was mildly pro China. Like a clearly western person living there showing off how great it is.
It wasn’t offensive or even off the mark but it felt like I was being served low grade propaganda.
Only foreign? Zuck during elections, Musk during elections. etc. Living in the EU, if I am gullible, when I open X, I have to believe that all Americans are mentally challenged. Being raised as a kid or gullible reading all that crap every day cannot be good for you right? Without foreign influence that is.
You were so close and nearly got there. It's not about fear of China controlling the narrative, it's about not being able to control the narrative on Tiktok like they are doing on other (American) platforms.
It's extremely telling that so many Americans in this thread are comfortably talking about "our local" companies and adversaries to the US, when the article is about a ban in...Canada.
The US and Canada are two of the closest allies in the world, and have been for a very long time. To many Americans, Canadians are also part of "us", at least when discussing global issues or adversaries.
A billionaire American lives in America and generally benefits if America benefits. A foreign country is not aligned to America’s interests and may be outright hostile to them.
This right here is incredibly stupid. One of the stupidest takes and a rampid and dangerous misconception among mostly young men I see as of late. Elon avoids taxes not because he likes this country, but because he benefits from it. Anything that maximizes his personal wealth could very well be hostile to the well being of the country. You should see how he treated his own children. Incredibly naive. Many rich men end up giving back to the communities that made them (Gates and others for instance). Elon, a child of parents that cashed in on apartheid, is certainly an exception.
Elon has literally paid billions of dollars in taxes.
Yes, he "avoids" taxes by using every legal strategy available to him, as does every single person who pays taxes. This is called "paying the correct amount of taxes you legally owe".
> Anything that maximizes his personal wealth could very well be hostile to the well being of the country.
Let's look at the things that have maximized his personal wealth:
Paypal - made online payments popular and safe. Enabled millions of people to start online business.
Tesla - made electric cars popular. Reduced C02 emissions. Gave thousands of Americans good jobs. Made many employees and investors rich.
SpaceX - re-ignited space exploration. pioneered re-usable rockets. Dramatically reduced the cost of launching satellites.
Starlink - brought Internet access to rural areas.
Please tell me, which of these personal wealth maximizing activities has been hostile to the US?
Many rick men are giving back for the soft power (i.e. the politics play). Or indirectly investing into their new ventures (like giving money to buy vaccines and also making the vaccines by their other company). Plus some interesting tax write-offs.
So, thanks for the charity, but I would rather prefer them to pay that as taxes.
Canada is in North America. It is not America. Yes the two countries are adjacent and the US has a strong influence on Canada, but you cannot equate one with the other figuratively or literally. Despite the influence they are very much distinct in many regards.
For most of the world, that "foreign government" is the US that pushes its propaganda via facebook, twitter and also by buying up local tv/news stations, newspapers, etc.
I know this is a US-centric site, but globally, you're a minority that pushes the most propaganda around.
...especially since the article is about canada, so US is a foreign government, and meta/x are foreign companies.
Let's take this one step further, then, and ask why we should allow private media ownership if it's this important. Why should some malevolent billionaire be able to own CNN or NYT and decide what stories they could publish? Does it matter if the billionaire has a US passport or not?
I really don't see why there's this cognitive dissonance. Limiting enemy states' government broadcasting power inside your territory is pretty low on the controversial things a gov can do.
Yes, as long as the same government doesn't bully other countries when their own propo^H^H^H^H^H social media platforms are blocked on the same grounds.
All fair complaints, but are those the standards you want to set for "banning any state-owned media from that country"? We're not enemies but I wouldn't call them our friends?
Canada didn’t ban non state-owned media. It didn’t even ban any media. TikTok is still allowed, RT is still accessible, private news sources, foreign annd domestic, exist at all levels through Canada.
We banned a single corporate entity from operating offices inside the country in response to credible intelligence that those offices pose a national security threat. That corporate entity is directly linked with an adversarial government with active election subversion campaigns.
Is there some reason you are twisting the actual circumstances around this?
When I read comments like yours I can't but think that we are being brainwashed.
The biggest foreign meddler and spy in Canada is the southern neighbor.
We know for a fact through leaks that US has put all Canadians under mass surveillance both in communication and movement (like the wifi hacking at airports leaked by Snowden) since more than a decade, or the 2023 Pentagon leaks that were quickly scolded as "but they were trying to find Russian activity in Canada", and don't forget the AT&T whistleblower which also exposed mass surveillance on Canadians by US intelligence.
And yet..nobody cares..even though we know for a fact it happens, we don't care let alone call the US an enemy.
So, what is the difference? The media and politicians calling 24/7 China your enemy (something nobody would've done before 2018/2017), but ignoring or pretending that the real spy of all spies which hacks and spies on all of its allies, even the personal phone of the German chancellor is cool.
I find those double standards not only mind blowing, but dangerous.
We're letting the White House to dictate globally who can play by the rules and who is an exception.
I didn’t say a thing about the US, nor did I imply support for it. I don’t like what the US is doing.
On the other hand pretending that the CCP and the US are meddling at the same level or with the same consequences, or that the CSIS isn’t in on half of what the US is doing is also silly.
I can condemn China and recognize that they pose a serious threat, while also condemning the US and recognizing that the threat is different.
<< When I read comments like yours I can't but think that we are being brainwashed.
Sadly, and I think I called that out few years ago, there was a notable turn in US foreign policy. In effect, it means establishment expects actual confrontation with China. This, naturally, means uptick in anti-China propaganda. It is a difficult position to take now in a pragmatic way given events in Ukraine and Israel, but that is clearly the direction. Hence, comments like those of OP.
They're conducting active cyberattacks on our infrastructure and allying themselves with states (Russia, North Korea) that are actively at war with our friends.
So you want the capacity to ban state-owned, or even partially state-owned, media from any country who has "allied" with a country actively at war with "our friends"? All of BRICS, anyone part of the BRI, just as the tip of the iceberg?
If there is a major nation on this planet that has never done anything bad to mine in its history I can think of is China.
I can remember American, British, French troops raping and humiliating that country, I can't remember a single time the opposite happened.
While China does not always play fair and there's plenty of despicable things they do I don't like, I just don't see them as my enemy and see no valid reason to do so.
When the Elkann family (which owns majority stake in Stellantis, Juventus, Ferrari and many others) got pissed off by the largest newspaper in Italy reporting on them (despite their businesses impacting the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of Italians) they simply bought the newspaper and the major critical voice of them disappeared.
"authentic" voices are sometimes not so authentic. And sometimes they start out authentic and end up being paid by foreign interests (some high profile cases of this earlier this year - "we didn't know the $100,000/week was coming from Russia")
Sure, but at least you have options and get to choose.
Long form content, unrestricted by executives telling people how to run their show, all that makes a big difference. There is no need for corporate bureaucrats to try to run things.
I'm an old-ish person (61). I started watching the news when I was about 12. I think we were better off as a society when there were basically 3 TV/radio networks (ABC,CBS and NBC) each dispensing basically the same dull, boring (by today's standards) newscast. There were newspapers, of course, and they tended to be where you'd find the more opinionated stuff, but there were limits on how many newspapers an entity could own in any particular market. The fairness doctrine reigned over broadcast news, so you wouldn't have stuff like Fox news and probably not even a lot of what's on MSNBC. It just feels to me like we had a more cohesive national vision and weren't nearly as divided as we are now. I'm sure this will be unpopular here, but I'm not sure more options has helped us in terms of being able to live together. So many families can't even meet for Thanksgiving dinner anymore, for example, because of the arguments that break out. People are living in completely different truth bubbles now which makes it almost impossible to communicate.
I'm don't want to be completely pollyannish about the past - there were probably things we weren't hearing about from those fewer outlets. But I'm also not sure how we move forward as a society in a situation where there are so many different shattered views of what is true.
I respectfully disagree. That state of affairs made people more “united” - perhaps, but it was at the expense of knowledge about the true nature of our reality.
We are “divided” now because we are basically in a battle for what is consensus reality, and the only way to have a satisfying answer to that question is to have unfettered access to the underlying facts and knowledge of who is who.
> We are “divided” now because we are basically in a battle for what is consensus reality
I'm concerned we're going to get to the point where people are willing to kill each other over what they consider to be their view of "consensus reality". That's happened often at other points in history. In many cases it was due to religious differences over what constituted "reality". I'm not so sure that many of these current squabbles over what constitutes "consensus reality" aren't religious in nature. Social media already seems to be pushing the limits of human nature in some destructive directions such that politics now is like holy war.
I think we need to focus more on the "consensus" part (including peacemaking and bridge building) instead of the "battle" part. I'm not seeing a lot of that happening. That requires a lot of humility as in we're all like blind people groping our way to figure out reality and none of us has the complete picture. Until we're ready to take on that kind of humility on a societal level, I think this "battle" you refer to can be a very dangerous endeavor.
It wasn’t long ago that we regularly witnessed rhetoric hinting at putting people into camps and denying them access to food because they didn’t buy into the official narrative about vaccines.
Is that a better option? I don’t think so.
I do agree that there is a basis for building bridges and finding common ground but this is better done at the local level between people vs. trying to force it from on high. And definitely, in my opinion, not via some controlled medium.
> It wasn’t long ago that we regularly witnessed rhetoric hinting at putting people into camps and denying them access to food because they didn’t buy into the official narrative about vaccines.
And where was that rhetoric happening? On social media. Outside of China (and maybe some similar regimes), I don't recall any government official suggesting anything about camps or limiting access to food (even China delivered food to the people they welded into their apartments, so not even there), certainly not in the US.
Everybody's favorite "anarchist" himself, Noam Chomsky, promoted just such an idea.
(Proving that he's not really an anarchist.)
Of course, he couched it terms of plausible deniability but anybody with the ability to read between the lines knew exactly what he was saying.
This was during the environment in which small and family-owned businesses were being destroyed (yes, in America) and people were losing their jobs as well. It happened to a number of personal friends.
There were far worse excesses in other Western nations too, not just in China. The only reason things didn't go further in the US here is because Americans have fewer vulnerabilities than citizens in other countries do in the face of this sort of oppression.
And it was all cheered on by those who believed themselves to be on the right side of the establishment at that time. It was a regular thing to see and hear people fantasizing about the idea of forced injections, online and in real life.
And we learned about all this on, yes, social media (which was heavily censored at the time too).
The legacy media outlets were not telling the truth.
All this was only three years ago.
Things are a little different now, I'm sure you will find in many cases that forgiveness is possible in light of true apologies, but there will not be a forgetting.
And these things need to be honestly discussed if we are ever to achieve anything resembling national cohesion again.
And yet if some other country bans US-controlled social media exactly for the same reasons, this works as a data point to label them as "lacking freedom of speech", "axis of evil", "undemocratic", etc.
But I do appreciate the honesty of at least admitting the hypocrisy.
Biotech billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong blocked an endorsement of Kamala Harris from the New York Times causing the resignations of many within the organization and a similar situation occurred with Bezos and the Washington Post . We have internal issues as well. I agree with what you are saying though. I don’t know what can remedy the apparent degraded integrity of social platforms and major news outlets, but I’m all ears. Federated platforms are compelling but no holy grail and such things founded on ideological extremes like Lemmy (developed by self professed Leninist Marxists) and the stigma around decentralized technologies make them less attractive.
I know this is shocking, but people don't have to look at TikToc or CNN no matter who owns it. Personally, I welcome the stat of Iran purchasing CNN and Putin buying TikToc. If the public doesn't like the apps/network they can use something different.
SO THIS! it's not about data protection, it's about the platform allowing misinformation and hate speech to thrive there. i've reported hundreds of videos, comments, and accounts - TikTok said they don't violate the community standards. the worst was yesterday - someone commented he was sad Hitler failed on a TikTok video about the Israeli hostages held by Hamas - and TikTok, after 30 minutes, said this doesn't violate community standards.
before anyone says "free speech" - views or comments that are not aligned with the CCP and its allies get taken down when reported. several of mine were taken down.
i owe the rising antisemitism among young people to TikTok and its lack of action towards misinformation and hate speech.
Like imagine if China owned CNN and the New York Times and decided what stories they could publish.