Summary

Donald Trump called TikTok “worthless” and suggested he might not intervene to lift its nationwide ban, which took effect on January 19 over national security concerns about its Chinese ownership.

Previously, Trump had pledged to save TikTok, citing its role in his campaign’s social media success, but his latest remarks hinted at demands for U.S. ownership of the platform.

House Speaker Mike Johnson supported the ban, citing fears of Chinese influence on TikTok’s algorithms.

  • UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml
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    14 hours ago

    Check bounced? Nah he got the check and it cleared and the world’s tiniest gear spun in his head and he thought “what if 2 checks?!?!!?”.

  • RaoulDook@lemmy.world
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    21 hours ago

    Man, I really hope he does the double-flipflop on this and bans it again. Because Tiktok pulled the stunt this weekend to kiss his ass, blocking the app preemptively for the USA and crediting Trump with “saving” it with the popup message. This would be most disruptive to the propaganda pushers on both sides of the globe, and piss off the most people against them.

      • Vladkar@lemmy.world
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        19 hours ago

        Nah, that’s too realistic for The Onion. It needs to be something like, ‘Pandemonium Ensues After Trump Utters First Coherent Sentence.’

    • Zaktor@sopuli.xyz
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      21 hours ago

      And this strategy works for him just fine. People who like him will believe the thing they want to hear and some of the people who would have opposed him will be confused and delay action because they think maybe it’s just going to work out and they should focus elsewhere.

  • zib@lemmy.world
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    16 hours ago

    I’m getting whiplash from all the backtracking and it’s only day two.

  • Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    This is leverage, nothing more. He has every intention of saving it. He’s just going to make sure that he gets his cut and assurances that any anti-Trump videos be scrubbed and any searches return no results. And he wants to make sure they continue to do what he wants, when he wants, and the way he wants by literally hanging a potential ban over their heads that he can sign into effect by EO at the stroke of his favorite sharpie.

    It is literally a Mafia protection racket on steroids.

    • RestrictedAccount@lemmy.world
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      11 hours ago

      I disagree. Trump and Musk own competitors to TokTok.

      They are not going to hurt themselves in order to help a Chinese competitor.

      Also, they are now in the ones in charge AND the Chinese government is actually using TikTok to spy on THEM.

    • emax_gomax@lemmy.world
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      19 hours ago

      The irony of trump saving it only to make it considerably more dangerous for American stability when it was originally banned because it was dangerous for no explained reason. A tiktok that caters to trump should be banned, but doing so is the only way not to be and well “corporations gonna corporate”.

      • alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml
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        8 hours ago

        Are we the psy-op going to chinese social media and humanizing Americans or are they the psy-op by acting human when the Americans show up?

        If it’s the first, where’s my check? If it’s the second, congrats to my chinese spy on landing the easiest job in the world.

    • qprimed@lemmy.ml
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      20 hours ago

      free market dynamics.

      you see, more people with eggs become financially desparate enough to sell their eggs to survive in this shithole country. this generlaly lowers the market value of those eggs.

      the egg extraction process can be painfu… oh. nevermind.