[tablespoon]

> [Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Twitter] is a national security threat.

That's a lazy thing to say. It's obvious that TikTok is qualitatively different from the perspective of the US and its allies.

It's like this: a gun in my hand could be a threat to me because I could accidentally shoot myself in the foot; but that's very different threat than a gun in the hand of a mugger who's pointing it at my head.

[the_af]

> It's obvious that TikTok is qualitatively different from the perspective of the US and its allies.

For those of us not in the US, it's not that different. We are always at the mercy of tech companies from a foreign power.

[tablespoon]

> For those of us not in the US, it's not that different. We are always at the mercy of tech companies from a foreign power.

That may be true, but the OP tweet (https://twitter.com/zachtratar/status/1571595169207812096) is referring to Americans specifically, and even for non-Americans, it's different for American-allied countries vs. ones with a more adversarial relationship. I don't think Americans would be concerned about TikTok if it were based in the UK or Italy, for instance.

[DeathMetal3000]

I’m pretty sure the Snowden leaks made it clear how the US chooses to treat its allies. So no, to anyone outside the US, Tik Tok isn’t substantially different from Facebook.

[anon291]

Then build your own. I mean it... good luck. You should absolutely advocate for your countries to limit their influence, and perhaps ban them from your country. Best of luck, but as an American, there's little I can do, unless you want me voting in your elections.

[the_af]

I'm sure you realize it's not that easy to "build your own" (for whatever tech, social network, internet, computers, etc). You don't have a head start and there are powerful forces working against you, both internal and external.

Though it's not outside the possibilities of a nation, it's still very hard.

[anon291]

I completely understand having divested myself of facebook, twitter and google and the like. I think if more nation states engaged, they would have more power than individuals or groups. Look what happened to parler, gab, and truth.

[pessimizer]

> That's a lazy thing to say. It's obvious that TikTok is qualitatively different from the perspective of the US and its allies.

No, it's lazy to say that your assertion is obviously true rather than arguing for it. It's an easy thing to do when you're part of a government-led crowd.

[cwkoss]

China is a national competitor, not an enemy who intends to kill us. Sinophobic propaganda has been unfortunately effective on too many people.

[tablespoon]

> China is a national competitor, not an enemy who intends to kill us. Sinophobic propaganda has been unfortunately effective on too many people.

You missed the point. Analogies aren't a one-to-one mapping between every aspect one situation and another, and you're going to have trouble if you interpret them that way. In this case, you picked on a feature that doesn't map to the situation under discussion to make an inflammatory suggestion.

To spell it out, very, very clearly: the analogy only demonstrates that "who holds the thing" is important for assessing a threat from a particular perspective. The US holds "[Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Snapchat, Twitter]" (which are all banned in China) and China holds TikTok (which is not banned in the US).

[cwkoss]

Its your analogy. If you think it is misleading, maybe you should have chosen a different one.

Maybe check your internal biases on why you chose one which includes murderous intent.

[tablespoon]

> Its your analogy. If you think it is misleading, maybe you should have chosen a different one.

It's not misleading, you just read too much into it. It's like quibbling with an analogy about "Alice and Bob" because your name isn't Alice or Bob.

> Maybe check your internal biases on why you chose one which includes murderous intent.

If someone is making an analogy about threats in general, it's silly to expect them to find a different a threat that's different but also exactly the same as the one being discussed. Analogies are used to highlight a particular aspect, and usually that means picking something that is different but very clearly highlights that particular aspect.

Again, to spell it out, very, very clearly: a gun is an easily understood threat that almost everyone understands can be held by different people. It is a good object for illustrating how a threat changes based on who "holds" it.

[NickC25]

They want to be THE de-facto global hegemon. They've stated this time and time again. It's literally in their name (Middle Country).

They don't want to kill us per-say, but they don't mind getting their hands dirty as long as the ends justify the means. In a battle over geopolitical, technological and militaristic superiority, killing one's enemy can happen.

[reducesuffering]

China is preparing to invade Taiwan in the coming decade and the US is committing to defend the 23 million people there from invasion. What part of that is propaganda?

[pessimizer]

> China is preparing to invade Taiwan in the coming decade

Propaganda. You can tell because China has never said that it intends to invade Taiwan, and you have no inside information. Propaganda is what makes you think you have inside information.

> the US is committing to defend the 23 million people there from invasion.

That's not propaganda. As far as I can tell, it's as much a declaration of war as if Xi said, on video, that the would commit the Chinese military to defend Florida if there were any US effort to prevent DeSantis sending immigrants out of Florida on buses.

China is not a submissive or weak country. I would honestly be surprised if they didn't start preparing to invade Taiwan (or as they would say, to send troops to Taiwan) ASAP after that interview.

edit: We can have WWIII, but it will be the US, BJP, and various poor authoritarian Eastern European states vs. everyone else. It'll be like WWII, except we can be the Axis this time. Hitler was as surprised as anyone that we weren't in the Axis last time.

[reducesuffering]

Here's Alperovitch predicting it, who called the Russian invasion of Ukraine far in advance, while you were busy denying it would ever happen.

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/digital-future-daily/20...

https://twitter.com/DAlperovitch/status/1570831201212203008

Here's you complaining about "horrifying virulence of Ukrainian nationalism", before the further invasion, definitely nothing about the soon to be start of Russian killing of Ukrainians.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27655651

Here's you advocating "Even better, maybe we can push Russia into using some tiny nuke" on Ukrainians.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30794567

That's all I have left to say to an obviously brainwashed war monger.

[tablespoon]

>> China is preparing to invade Taiwan in the coming decade...What part of that is propaganda?

> Propaganda. You can tell because China has never said that it intends to invade Taiwan, and you have no inside information.

Uh dude, they repeatedly make it clear the option to invade is on the table, and they've even withdrawn a previous promise not to send military occupation forces. And if you haven't been paying attention: a little more than a month ago they conducted live-fire exercises that looked a lot like practicing for a blockade of Taiwan.

That's all out in the open. "Inside information" is not necessary.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/10/china-reaffirms-thr...

[angryasian]

Cambridge analytica / Facebook misinformation and usage within its borders would let you know all social media companies are a problem