[nimbius]

Bytedance already won.

Biden flat-out admitted he was not going to enforce the law once it passed, and Trump is pushing for a 90 day "Extension" because "finding a buyer" has proven more difficult than initially expected. this statement is intended to save face as bytedance has repeatedly refused to sell.

What we are watching now is US leaders in both houses of the oligarchy (democratic and republican) scramble to undo policy that was written by people who think the US still has the type of pull it had in the sixties. banning Tiktok in the USA would mean one of the largest social platforms of more than 150 nations combined would have zero US presence.

the US must constantly and vehemently evangelize western values and hegemony in order to protect and maintain the international neoliberal hegemony it has come to enjoy. Washington realizes they have effectively and accidentally cut themselves off from a system of propaganda they benefit from domestically (election rhetoric and stumping) as well as internationally (hearts and minds doctrine of diplomacy and soft power.)

Its bad to operate in a contested environment with china, but its worse to endure a denied environment where the only voices are not yours.

[saturn8601]

Interesting point...that leads one to think why did they make this stumble? US generally is a smooth political operator. I immediately go to the theory that their hand was forced to make this bad move by another actor (maybe pro-israel donors). Of course who knows the truth really.

[galangalalgol]

The reason Trump will reverse it is that it helped him get elected. He said this in interviews already. "It is hard to hate it when...".

It also helped that Hungarian candidate when tiktok was used by Russia to push him...

It should be gone. I wish we would ditch FB too. And SEO. Kill all the algos and let me find stuff via regex.

[parpfish]

I assume he’s also trying to line up a buyer that would be friendly to him

[warner25]

Regarding Trump, yes. Also,

> Kill all the algos and let me find stuff via regex

I love this. As someone who increasingly feels old and dissatisfied with what computing is turning into, I'm going to start using this along with things like "you'll have to pry local accounts, passwords, and plain text email from my cold, dead hands."

[dfadsadsf]

> It also helped that Hungarian candidate when tiktok was used by Russia to push him...

That's actually misinformation and narrative invented to support coup by Romanian security services/supreme court to cancel elections. No Russians were involved. TikTok campaign was financed by center-right party but backfired in unexpected ways.

https://www.politico.eu/article/investigation-ties-romanian-...

[galangalalgol]

The linked article doesn't say that, nor does any of the ones it linked to about the eu investigation.