Do you think TikTok will be banned?

Other - I don't care. Doesn't affect me one way or the other. Not on it. Never used it.

I do however feel bad for the disabled community because it is widely used by disabled persons and a way to connect. Guess it is easier to use than IG.

I think that USA Tik Tok will take the financial hit of divesting of China connections/backing before they allow themselves to be totally banned and shutdown in the US. It is a game of chicken right now with TikTok seeing how far it can go without imminent shutdown before they sacrifice the $$$.

ETA: the proliferation of TikTok supports my life/family/community ads on television in the DC Metro area in the past few weeks has led me to believe it is a game of chicken. 

I’m not on it so I don’t have a dog in that fight, but I think all of these social media platforms spy on everyone so much. It’s more than just monitoring what people post on their own platform though. They also spy on all the websites you visit and probably listen to us through device microphones too. I can see where that could be a problem for national security depending on who they’re following and what they’re picking up on. Or maybe my tinfoil hat is a little too tight, LOL.

I agree. I have only watched little bits of the questioning but what I did see was not great. Many of the questions should be asked of an IT expert ahead of the hearing. Not asked to the ceo of a company. I can say that what I have heard from my own kids and from watching tik toks, this has really made them think poorly of politicians.

I can see why governments or other agencies wouldn’t want their employees to have the app on their devices but if they are going to do an outright ban they need to have accurate information given and explanations from a neutral expert.

Do I think it will be banned? No, not from the general population.

What I see on TikTok is weeks or months ahead of IG/Reels. Someone sends me a video from Reels, and I have seen it ages ago on TT.

I really think the owners of other Social Media are up in arms because they are loosing out big time on ad revenue to TT. And they FOR SURE sell our data and info. To god knows who. They also skew what we see.

Some of those asking questions at the hearing revealed themselves to be very uniformed idiots. Whew.

Our data for everything is being mined by powers that we have no control over.

John Deere takes ALL GPS data from those who use their GPS. All cropping data, planting, harvest, acres, etc. Every damn bit of info. For free. That is some very valuable data. And the farmer gets "free maps printed"... Ah..free! JD will use this data to form their operator-free software and, IMO, that data will be available to those entities that are buying up massive amounts of farm ground. That is something that should be worried about WAY more than China and TikTok.
I do not use any Deere software. They can't control any of my machinery.

No, but I'd love to see it go away. It's crap.

I'm so curious, what is on your tik tok feed that makes it 'crap"? Millions of users and you find no valuable content?


I've never seen an algorithm that is so spot on for reflecting the user's habits an interests.

Bridget in MD & StephDRebel - I am not on TikTok. I have but don't use IG, Twitter, Snap, YouTube. I use Facebook. My issue with TikTok (all forms of SM really) is that my HS students (and my own kid) are CONSTANTLY on it, they're finding stupid things to do and emulating them, they get in trouble for doing the things they see "influencers" do, and they're "creating content" when they need to be doing school work. It's a HUGE disruption (as is all forms of social media) in the classroom and dealing with cell phones that are MUCH more interesting than their classwork they're supposed to be doing. I'm constantly taking phones and the consequences according to the district handbook are not being followed because we don't want to suspend kids due to the negative impact on the all important "dashboard" that the state has. I have kids who have tad their phone taken away more than a dozen times- usually because they're on TikTok or some other SM platform- and have yet to be suspended for it. It's a constant battle that it just such a disruption to the classroom.

Most recently, my students were watching "side shows" and bragging about being there. These are 16-18 year olds. There was a shooting at it and one of my students lost 2 family members in it. The content promotes things that these kids don't need to be involved in.

It's just a super distraction and exposes kids to things they don't need to be exposed to. My 11 year old got the idea to do a "prison" style tattoo and was collecting the materials to do. Thankfully I found out and figured it out. She's a great kid, 4.0+ student, involved in multiple activities, well liked, etc... just found a "cool" video she wanted to try out. Um, no thank you. We've since had discussions regarding what is a good idea and what is not. But, had she not seen it on a friends TikTok, she wouldn't have even thought to do it.

Well I’m old, so I’m not in the target market.

I have FB for connecting with my cousins in other states (all of our parents are deceased) and fun project/hobby information. I occasionally use YouTube for instructional videos and webcams, but I won’t pay for access. I don’t have twitter, TT, IG, or Snapchat. I occasionally look at Reddit for news articles, but I find the comment sections full of …. Let’s just say I’m not impressed and don’t take anything posted seriously. People are nuts.

Unlike most people, I don’t get any political information on FB. The only time I see anything political is in the groups I join, if it’s allowed at all. I immediately leave those groups. The thing that bothers me most is the lies and misinformation I see on every imaginable topic in social media groups. It’s rampant and goes unchecked because of group think and confirmation bias.

I think people are addicted to social media so it’s not going anywhere.

Just to clarify for Australia, Congressional hearings are never about getting issues resolved. They're about members of Congress getting air time on TV so they have a clip that might get them invited onto a discussion show later that day. 

When TikTok first came out I was in China visiting and the Chinese people there were very adamant that I stay way away from it as they were led to believe it was one more Chinese govt spying agent.
If the damn Chinese won’t be a part of TikTok then I don’t want anything to do with it at all.

My DH, who is in IT security and agrees with the majority other IT security folks, that Tik Tok specifically is a HUGE security risk. The company he works for uses several social media platforms to connect and engage with customers but Tik Tok is not allowed on any company owned devices. But do I think it will go...no. It should, but I don't think it will.