#TikTok economy

[spiderpanic]

I know a lot of people who are not on TikTok like to look down at the app and pretend that its a stupid, useless thing. But the truth is that Tiktok has millions of users. Tiktok feed

[erdkuttam]

TikTok goes dark in US for users | 90-Day Extension

In recent months, the conversation surrounding TikTok, the popular short-form video app owned by the Chinese company Byte Dance, has grown increasingly intense. With national security concerns at the forefront, the Trump administration has been mulling over a potential ban of the app in the United States. The Trump Administration Considers 90-Day Extension to Avoid Complete US Ban Over National…

[catchymemes]

[agentoffangirling]

As the Supreme Court is now hearing arguments on the TikTok ban, I feel like this is an excellent time to remind everyone that getting rid of TikTok is NOT a good thing

And the reason I bring it up specifically on here is bc I have seen far too many people claim that the ban is for the better, that they're so glad it's gone, that people spend way too much time on it (side note, that's social media in general, it's not just TikTok babes. You're spending 15 hours on Tumblr alone, I'll bet). Even if you don't use TikTok and you absolutely hate its guts, trust me when I say you'll want it to stay

Firstly, there's been very little evidence that TikTok's Chinese owner, Bytedance, has been data mining Americans on order of China. Majority of the evidence has not been released to the public and the stuff that has has been censored. Of course the risk that it could exists-- but you cannot simply assume it's doing this all the time, 24/7, when no current evidence has been presented

TikTok has been taking massive steps to insure that American data is protected, primarily with Project Texas. All American data is stored in the United States and controlled by Americans. Again, American data is with AMERICANS

It is also one of the very few apps that is not dominated by American companies. Does no one find it odd that the only foreign-owned application is being singled out, when companies like Meta and Google have arguably done worse damage? Is no one pointing that out?

Due to this, it allows for less mainstream news to flourish on the app. Palestinians have been able to raise their voices and call to attention what is happening in the region, and activists have pushed the crises of Congo and Sudan to the forefront. No other major social media app and news organization has done this, in fact, Meta censored pro-Palestinian content and immediately toggled on a feature for all users that limited political content

And TikTok is just the start. If it gets banned, do you really think everything else is safe? You think you're safe here on Tumblr? On Ao3? On Instagram? NO

At some point they are going to start going after other apps. They'll celebrate and pat themselves on the back that they "protected democracy" but really they limited free speech. They limited alternative voices. It is not an "if" but "when" they begin going after apps that do not conform to their every single standard

If TikTok goes down, they all do

[onlytiktoks]

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-judge-strikes-down-biden-overtime-pay-rule-2024-11-15/

[fairuzfan]

I don't understand why people are so against boycotting Starbucks honestly. Ok separate from Palestine, don't you want to help take down a megacorp? Isn't this what you all were saying with "eat the rich"? Well. We're eating them!

[valtsv]

my favourite thing in temeraire is when temeraire asks a question like okay but why do we even NEED people in charge why can't we all just make our own decisions and agree to be really cool about it and laurence has to be like that's a nice thought my dear but you have got to stop talking like that in public or the government is going to have me Killed

[thashining]

"if our family dies and leaves us money that they've already paid taxes on, we then have to pay taxes on what they left us, we pay taxes on our retirement, etc. We are taxed to death!"

"hold on hold on; in the US, even if you've PAID OFF YOUR MORTGAGE & OWN THE DEEDS, you still have to pay an annual tax to continue living in the house that you own outright? this is madness!"

"China Government owns strategic companies, those companies put back profits into the Chinese Treasury and money is put back to serve people. In US & SA 🇿🇦 Billionaires own companies and buy yachts"

Men 60 Women 55

[l0vescented]

so what now..?

its over. the app's banned. ive heard rumors that one of the main billionaire dickheads might buy the app, but honestly id rather it be gone than have it be owned by elon musk or fucking mark zuckerberg.

for now, i think tiktok was the only app that got banned. but it won't end there. the goal isn't just to ban an app, it's to silence people who are speaking out against the government, because we as americans, whether we recognize it or not, are living in a fascist nation.

fascist nations ban apps to stop people from communication with other nations.

fascist nations portray other nations, and even other people in the nation, as the enemy, so that the people living in that fascist nation are too busy fighting each other to recognize the issue.

all the things that have happened after this past election have made me realize that, despite what some may think, politics have never been about left vs. right. it's about up vs. down. those who are high up have made it so that those all the way down here are so busy shooting ourselves that we never think to aim upwards.

AIM UPWARDS.

[thoughtportal]

an important factor to remember in the writers strike. So many industries want to turn the worker into a gig worker with no protections and no mentoring system. 

[seenthisepisode]

i will say with my whole chest that i hate what is happening with music marketing right now. i hate that a song needs to be a tiktok trend. i hate that one album is being released in 23 ways to trick people into buying multiple albums because there are different covers and different photos inside. i hate that one album is being rereleased multiple times as deluxe and then the super deluxe and then super secret version with one additional song just to make the numbers!!!!!! i hate that people without vinyl players buy multiple vinyls of the same album just to own them and collect them. i know no one is making anyone buy multiple versions of the same fucking album by putting a gun to their head BUT COME ONNNNN its all about the money and people and just giving into that!!!!!!!!

[spiderpanic]

A lot of people make their entire livelyhoods off of tiktok. I know a lot of people look down on the app for being a "silly dance app" but its so much more than that. It has been a powerful tool in uniting people that would otherwise never have even bothered to learn about the world around them. I have never seen any other social media site do somthing like this.

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇸 🚨

UNITED STATES CONGRESS PASSES SERIES OF ANTI-DEMOCRATIC AND PRO-WAR BILLS DESPITE PUBLIC OPPOSITION

The United States Congress and Senate passed a series of bills, including three controversial anti-democratic and pro-war bills, two of which were tied together, on Saturday, bypassing public opinion and popular opposition to the profligate, pro-war, globalist, Neolib/Neocon agenda currently driving United States domestic and foreign policy.

Included in the bills passed was a bill to force TikTok to divest from its connections with China at risk of being banned immediately, which naturally was tied to a Foreign aid bill.

However, as even Republican Senator Rand Paul mentioned in an opinion piece in Reason Magazine, the Bill is almost certain to lead to more power for American political elites and their administrations to pressure companies like Apple and Google to further ban apps and sites that offer contradictory opinions to that of the invented narratives of the American Political class.

Before long, Americans, many of whom are already poorly informed, and heavily misinformed by their mainstream media, could lose access to critical information that contradicts the narratives of the United States government and corporate elites.

Horrifically, this only the start. The US Congress also extended the newly revised FISA spy laws, which gives the United States government the power to spy on the electronic communications of foreigners, while also conveniently sweeping up the conversations of millions of Americans, as we learned years ago thanks to the sacrifices of whistle blowers and journalists like Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange.

The new FISA Law goes further than this, however, granting US Intelligence agencies the power to spy on the wireless communications of Americans in completely new ways.

A recent Jacobin article describes these new powers as a, "radical expansion of government surveillance that would be ripe for abuse by a future authoritarian leader", or it could just be used by the authoritarian leadership we have right now, and have had for decades.

In fact, when one commentator described the new powers as "Stasi-like," Edward Snowden himself replied with a long post in which he remarked, "invocation of "Stasi-like" is not only a fair characterization of Himes' amendment, it's probably generous. The Stasi dared not even dream of what the Himes amendment provides."

The amendment in question just "tweaks" the current law's definition of an "electronic communication provider," which is being changed to "any service provider," something extremely likely to be abused by the government to force anyone with a business, a modem and people using their broadband to collect the electronic communications of those people, while also forcing their victims into silence.

The government could essentially force Americans to spy on other people and remain silent about it. Cafe's, restaurants, hotels, business landlords, shared workspaces all could get swept up into the investigations of the Intelligence agencies.

Worse still, because picking out the communications of a single user would be next to impossible, all of their victim's data would end up being surrendered to the authorities.

Sadly, the assault on Americans by their own political elites didn't end there, to top this historic day in Congress, at time when the United States public debt is growing at an astounding rate of $1 trillion every 100 days, US lawmakers also passed a series of pro-war aid packages to American allies (vassals) totalling some $95 billion.

Included in the foreign aid bill are aid packages totalling $61 billion for the Ukraine scam, $26 billion for Israel's special genocide operation in the Gaza Strip, and $8 billion to the Indo-Pacific to provoke WWIII with China, at the same time we're also provoking a nuclear holocaust with the Russian Federation.

Also buried in these aid packages is the authorization for the United States government to outright steal the oversees investments of the Russian Federation, and thereby the Russian taxpayers.

Astonishingly, and in direct opposition to the wishes of their own voters, Republican support was won without the possibility of conditioning the aid to any kind of border security, this despite the issue being among the top biggest concerns of Republican voters.

Although much of the money is to be used replenishing the heavily depleted stocks of America's weapons and munitions, it remains unclear where the munitions are expected to come from, as US defense production has remained sluggish and slow to expand despite heavy investments and demand in recent years, despite the rapid urgency with which the policy elite describe the situation.

It bodes poorly for working Americans that only a relatively small handful of lawmakers opposed the bills, producing unlikely bedfellows like Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Mike Lee in the Senate, opposing the FISA bill.

While in the House, the loudest opposition to the foreign aid bill mostly came from populist Republicans such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie and Paul Goser. Only 58 Congresmembers voted against the Foreign Aid Bill in which the TikTok ban was tucked.

Not one word from American politicians about the need to raise the minimum wage, which hasn't been increased since 2009 despite considerable inflation, nor a word about America's endlessly growing homelessness crises, property crime increases, or the 40-year stagnation of American wages, the deterioration of infrastructure, and precious little was said besides complaints about border security over the immigration crises sparked by American Imperialist adventures and US sanctions.

What we've learned today is that we are highly unlikely to see any changes to the insane behavior of the US and its allies any time soon, neither with regards to the absolutely bonkers Neocon foreign policy leading us to the edge of abyss, nor the spending-for-the-rich/austerity-for-the-poor Neoliberal domestic policy of the last 45 years.

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@WorkerSolidarityNews

Blue: titles are opinion pieces or analysis, and may or may not contain sources.

[catchymemes]

She's just a toddler.

[deviiancetv]

TikTok Has FINALLY Closed Up Shop 🎉🙌🏽

Well, it’s official. TikTok has been banned here in the United States, the land of the “free” and home of future tyrants. I’ve never been the fondest of TikTok in terms of how it’s treated black content creators, the entertainment industry being completely altered by its presence, and the microwavable content we’ve seen over these past 6 years.

I mean, with my last few blog posts being TikTok related, you know this app was NEVER my cup of tea… it barely gave matcha.

TikTok is not my nooch

Is TikTok getting banned?

Mine and Everyone’s Problem with TikTok

The Problem with Social Media (Podcast Video)

I’ll admit, I did TRY redownloading the app last year to commence my *✴︎𝒜𝑉𝒜𝒩𝒯𝐼𝒵𝐸𝒩✴︎* agenda, but that did not work… I gave up after not getting the high volumes of traffic, and to be honest, I got bored of making short-form content that I could care less about to begin with. I’m ready for a YouTube competitor to hop into the ring. Let’s bring long-form content back to its roots with an innovative platform, less strict copyright/DMCA laws, and reachable audience access via an algorithm replicating TikToks reach.

However, there’s a part of my brain that is conspiracizing that once Trump gets into office, he’s going to get an executive order to keep TikTok, but only sell it to an American owner (most likely someone in his family, Elon, Zuckerberg or a wealthy billionaire). TikTok has too much of a monopoly on content creation at this current time *sadly* and America only cares so much about making the data safety concerns an issue because they’re not making money off of profits from the app. They don’t care about Gen-Z Zoomer conspiracy theories and celebrity gossip, they just want a piece of the profit and TikTok doesn’t make any money over here, yet.

While it’ll be a huge shift for TikTok to no longer exist in our country, I think it’s all for the better to get REAL creativity back into the mainstream media, as well as regain people’s attention spans. 2025 numerologically is a year 9, this year is all about transformation, big shifts, rebirth and change to prepare for the restart to come next year. TikTok getting banned was all a part of the change too…

I’ve heard there are other apps people are looking to join, but let’s be real, y’all never give any of these new apps a chance for no longer than a week to a month. RedNote will be a flop soon, Lemon8 is likely next to be banned, that Neptune beta app probably will be forgotten as soon as it hits the app store, and whatever else people are talking about joining won’t matter. You can’t make fetch happen sadly, that’s always the case whenever a new app goes viral but loses momentum shortly after its release.