Trudeau government bans TikTok from operating in Canada

Instead of the laser focus on TikTok as a threat, it would be better for the US and Canada to have real data protection laws that would apply equally to TikTok, Meta, Google, Apple, and X. What the EU has done is far from perfect but it bans the worst practices. The Chinese can buy all of the information they want on Americans and Canadians from ad brokers, who will happily sell them everything they need to track individuals' locations.

Perhaps the way to get anti-regulation politicians on board with this is for someone to do what was done to Robert Bork and legally disclose lots of personal info on members of Congress/Parliament, obtained from data brokers and de-anonymized.

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.

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.

The US political system is very undemocratic and most of us Americans have no more means of influencing it than we do China's.

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.