The harms are so obvious I am wondering why I am even discussing it.
Obviously giving your primary geo-strategic competitor (with a history of propaganda) access at massive scale to shape opinion, promote discord, polarisation etc etc in the next generation of youth is a bad thing.
Not to mention the harvesting of personal data at massive scale and who knows how that might be used in the context of an AI-driven future.
You'd have to be ridiculously naive not to see that.
> to shape opinion, promote discord, polarisation etc etc in the next generation of youth is a bad thing
I remain unconvinced that people aren't shaping their own opinions by continuing to pursue similar content to what they typically agree with already. And as we all know, at this current time TikTok's algo is indistinguishable from US competitors in the obvious way it buckets people into like-minded feeds + comments.
At minimum we should be consistent in what we claim is the bad behavior. If the algo is really the problem, start regulating all of them and do it now. To do otherwise is hypocrisy.
> who knows how that might be used in the context of an AI-driven future
I'm not sure we want to legislate and set rules based on a "who knows". If the outcome is bad you need to define that bad outcome.
"I remain unconvinced that people aren't shaping their own opinions by continuing to pursue similar content to what they typically agree with already. And as we all know, at this current time TikTok's algo is indistinguishable from US competitors in the obvious way it buckets people into like-minded feeds + comments..."
You have not the slightest clue whether this is true or not.
Why does China block all foreign social media access within its own borders?
Wouldnt it be wonderful if we in the West could advocate for our own interests inside China the way the Chinese can participate in our conversations.