#posted this to facebook too so

[snippydippy]

So, Tiktok's back. After only about ten hours.

When it went down (several hours ahead of schedule, as if plans had to be moved forward), we got a notice praising trump for trying to help the app, and a video from Tiktok's CEO expressing the same sentiment.

This was already a massive red flag to me. Trump was the one who started the TikTok ban idea in the first place. It was literally a part of his campaign after TikTok was used to prove he was lying about his rally attendance numbers.

Despite this, Tiktok has been given a 90-day extension by the Trump administration. This 90-day extension is contingent on a deal already being in motion to sell Tiktok (in full or in majority shares), to an American company.

The CEOs for both TikTok and Meta are expected to be at Trump's inauguration tomorrow. Facebook also started pushing a "link your meta to Tiktok" option the day before the ban took place, and they now have an official Tiktok page after keeping the two companies as strictly separate competitors for years. It is my belief that this all points to Mark Zuckerberg having bought/merged with TikTok. Something that had likely been planned for a while, with last night's brief and early shut-down being a stunt to upset all of us who've come to rely on TikTok for a variety of reasons.

Whether you're one of the 7 million content creators or small business owners who legitimately earned your living off the app, or simply a part of the 170 million Americans (half the fuckin' country) who became attached to it from healthy community interaction, news dependency, or even a toxic addiction to it's quick and easy dopamine (I am a mix of all of these, personally), the ban going into affect last night likely caused you an amount of stress. Anguish, even, depending on your situation.

But now, as of this morning, Trump is suddenly our savior. After about two years of him pushing his opinion that Tiktok should be banned, now one of the richest men in the country and his company stands to benefit from Tiktok sticking around. And so will Trump, with Zuckerberg's money in his pocket.

I'm glad it's back, truly. I love Tiktok and the people I've met there, the communities fostered and the hard-working Americans who've found success on the platform. However, selling to Meta is NOT good.

Zuckerberg is nothing but an elite POS. He does not care about you, his company and all of his apps have ALWAYS been more predatory with your data than Tiktok EVER was. Meta has collected more of it, sold it to more advertisers and private investors with an interest in the public's free-time habits, and has done nothing if not try to monopolize your presence online.

Tiktok's algorithm may end up changing. It may end up having to bend to Meta's whims. Less personalization, more of your data being sold to advertisment that we might see an increase in. Shadow-bans, community muffling, news censorship and political biases being promoted, etc.

I don't know what I suggest doing about this. Even though it would be the best move, I would be a hypocrite to say "remove all meta associated apps from your phone." I can't delete my Facebook/meta account. Not without dedicating a flashdrive or several to saving pictures, videos and posts as pieces of my life from the past 15 years I have been on this website. I know many others feel the same, there isn't really anywhere else we can go. That is by design.

I know RedNote is where a lot of folks went, and I genuinely think the cultural exchange on that app between American and Chinese citizens is a wonderful thing, but I do not feel right about signing up for an app that is explicitly owned by the Chinese government anymore than I would on an app explicitly owned by our own (which, Meta practically is. They just get to hide behind a thin veil of a "private company". One that can pay to control political decisions. Our government is its own private company, but I digress). Bluesky might be the best alternative, but its Twitter-like format is annoying to me, personally.

TL;DR

I guess all of this is just to say; Don't fall for this shit. It's all extremely fishy and smells like Trump raising his approval rating with young voters, and Zuckerberg extending his reach over the way we all connect with each other and raising his net worth. Please stay as aware as you can.

More than just a "haha funny app", TikTok grew to be the most important way that hundred of millions of Americans connected with each other.

It is how WE THE PEOPLE connect. Potentially losing it to yet another leading company in the oligarchy our country truly is, its a blow to all of us, regardless of what political party you identify with.

[callmeizukunotdeku]

I was a kid with a Hunger Games hyperfixation and, from time to time, I'll get reminded of the books. With Trump's inauguration and the TikTok ban and unban, I can't stop thinking about a political tactic called panem et circenses, or bread and circuses.

In Mockingjay, Collins writes "'It’s a saying from thousands of years ago, written in a language called Latin about a place called Rome,' he explains. 'Panem et Circenses translates into "Bread and Circuses." The writer was saying that in return for full bellies and entertainment, his people had given up their political responsibilities and therefore their power.'"

In Collins' world, the Hunger Games was the entertainment. In ours, it's social media. Twitter, Meta, TikTok, are all controlled by political powers. Musk, Zuckerberg. TikTok is owned by Yiming and Rubo, but with the ban and unban, the content it shows in America is filtered to fit Trump's political agenda.

It's entertainment at the cost of information.

[my-autism-adhd-blog]

It is estimated those with ADHD receive 20,000 corrective or negative messages by age 10

Neurodivergent_lou

[boyofzoot]

[icewindandboringhorror]

I know this is just a silly bad quality random screencap of a screencap that I found on facebook lol, BUT it's a succinct enough image to easily describe the concept in a quick/accessible way hopefully :

-

(and of course, feel free to elaborate in tags, etc.! (especially elaborating about other senses as well.. can you "hear" in your mind just as well as you can "see"? taste? etc.) It's an interesting topic to me, as someone who's like a 4.5 at MOST lol. I'm curious what option will be the most common :0c )

[liquidstar]

see, i think boops should be a forever feature BUT i also think they should be limited as a forever feature (rather than a one day gimmick, where going balls to the wall makes more sense) so you can only do two or three per hour. not because i mind the boop spam (its great) but bc the IDEAL version of the feature would make it so you can tell your friends and mutuals and such "im saying hi ^_^" and if there are too many the message will be harder to get across. however i do think on april fools unlimited boops should be allowed, even in conjunction with future gimmicks. thats my opinion.

[outlying-hyppocrate]

So Normal about my characters. yes i gave them their own handwriting styles and made up little dialogues on paper like they were passing notes in class. still Normal by the way

[leverage-ot3]

hozier starting to sing take me to church and then unfurling a pride flag healed something in me actually

if you listen closely you can hear me yell ‘oh my god’ when he does it

[doccywhomst]

♫ CLOWN MUSIC INTENSIFIES ♪

[dr-pipis]

the aipocalypse on pinterest is fucking insane @wriheart and i have been looking at ai generated kitchens for the past like 25 minutes and discovered the oven/stove is always the tell

[a-god-in-ruins-rises]

actually...

looking at a bunch of my old favorite mutuals blogs that have been inactive for years. i miss them, even if i never really talked to any of them. when you're mutuals with a person for so long they become a comforting presence even without talking. you see them every day and read their posts about their thoughts or feelings or about what's going on in their life and so on. and they just become a part of your daily life in such a subtle way.

and then one day they just never post again. without warning. shit sucks. i actually hate it.

[frameconfessions]

What I love about Warframe as a newcomer is that there doesn't seem to be any sort of shipping wars or fandom discourse at all. I've been into a lot of shooters before (ie. Overwatch, Apex Legends, etc.) so Warframe is a huge breath of fresh, clean air.

💯

[mooreaux]

Someone posted your emmrich/rook art on a dragon age group I'm in on FB and lemme just say it was sorta wild seeing you on that platform lol I immediately fangirled a bit 😅 wasn't sure if you were okay with that happening but they did make sure to give you credit and link your tumblr

I'm generally not cool with reposting but since it was in a group I guess it's better than just out in the wild?? I'm flattered people like my stuff so much, I suppose! And thank you for letting me know!

[imaginethathaikyuu]

it actually makes me sick to see people share the BDS boycott list but continue to support companies on the list lmao

one of my mutuals just made 3 tweets in a row about getting mcdonalds when a month ago they were making a thread of helpful information, posting the bds list, and tweeting the watermelon emoji

like do you actually give a fuck about whats happening or are you only virtue signaling for retweets? this shit is so fucking mind numbing like im so pissed off and i know im directing my anger at something small retrospectively but how are you going to be a hypocrite in this situation how are you going to pretend to care how are you going to ignore the simple things we’ve been asked to do i want to just scream

when the bare minimum is not supporting corrupt brands, and self proclaimed leftists can’t even do that, how is anything going to change. am i going to be angry for the rest of my life

[t3acupz]

i was feeling nostalgic so i logged onto my deactivated facebook from a decade ago and omfg the hannibal stuff on there

- so i did watch s1 while it was airing but i was on facebook with my friends and not really on tumblr for the fandom stuff

- i was very confused why there wasn’t more material from red dragon in the show (i was a book fan first)

- i thought hannibal ate abigail at the end of s1, a friend said she didn’t think so because hannibal cared about her but i was convinced he did (bzztWRONG)

- being sad i had to wait a year for s2

- no one really shipped hannigram until s2 when homoerotic subtext was way more obvious

- everyone thought hannibal was a monster and will was hot (buzzfeed made listicles)

- obsessing over mukozuke and begging my friend to hurry up and watch the episode

- i said the cgi for “the deer” annoys me (A+ criticism)

- me liking this post from the hannibal facebook page and aww that hashtag #kickthebucket

- convincing my friend that hannigram was canon 👇

- my statement about mizumono “honestly they were boyfriends and will broke his heart”

that was a trip. it’s been a decade so it was hard to remember exactly how i felt watching s1 and s2 so wow yeah hope you guys enjoyed reading that

[mynameismckenziemae]

Because I don’t have enough on my plate, my mother -in-law keeps reminding me to send out hand-written thank you cards to everyone that donated to our GoFundMe. 🙃