TikTok ban in the US - what’s the aim here?

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I couldn’t see another thread on this. If there is one, please link it as it’d be interesting to read.

Is this genuine concern over harvesting of data? Or a play to pull all social media in the US under government control? Musk already owns X, if he was to buy TikTok then surely you’re looking at large swathes of social media being run by the government?

In the Times "The greatest achievement of Donald Trump’s first term was to take a scalpel to much of this corruption: kicking Huawei out of US infrastructure, putting an embargo on advanced semiconductors and initiating the US shutdown of TikTok, a company that has reams of data on 170 million American users, manipulates its news feed to favour the CCP and is proving a vital asset as the world moves towards hot war.

What was the CCP’s response? Peer-reviewed papers reveal covert manipulation of the TikTok algorithm — in which the CCP owns a golden share — to assist Trump’s 2024 victory by allowing more posts that questioned the 2020 election result and inflamed woke issues (it is remarkable how often key Trump acolytes cite TikTok as a key factor in the landslide). One also notes that Jeffrey Yass, who owns 15 per cent of TikTok, has given tens of millions of dollars to Republican candidates and is a key Trump donor. Trump now — surprise, surprise — professes himself “warm” towards the company and may reverse the ban. In other words, the gambit seems to have weakened the hawkish stance of this famously transactional president."

https://www.thetimes.com/article/968f8606-a3e6-46d7-b655-902aa9f2a16e?shareToken=d7159d6f69b3e0589aa99fc55549b751

So the announcement crediting Trump, which will undoubtedly make Trump very popular with American TikTok fans is not that surprising, I guess.

And as expected Dons given a reprieve

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjde3p0rnjgo

Apparently it’s back up for USA?

Exactly what I said this morning on this thread - Trump gets the credit 🙄