The short and sweet of it is that we need a way to enshrine “reciprocity” into the legal code that allows us to treat firms from authoritarian nations pursuing whole-of-society strategies against us as fundamental threats or in the same manner as our firms in those countries are treated, depending on the specifics of what the firm is and does.
If that requires a Constitutional amendment to allow discrimination based on a firm’s ownership, so be it, it’d pass. But I’d prefer that legal precedent from the Cold War be drawn on.
I would like a fuller reconciliation between the views in this post with the views in the misinformation post that went public just yesterday (https://www.slowboring.com/p/misinformation?s=r).
There's a disconnect that I'll simplistically and churlishly state as follows: "Misinformation is a made-up issue, stop with that nonsense. Except for TikTok, that one really is misinformation and is bad."
Matt, when I saw the headline I was very excited because I thought you would *finally* address the point that I've brought up to you on Twitter multiple times over the past two years whenever you talk about restricting TiKTok: there is a First Amendment right to consume foreign-created Communist propaganda. That was decided by the Supreme Court in Lamont v. Postmaster General, 381 US 301 (1965). (Here's a summary of the case: https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/848/lamont-v-postmaster-general ) Instead, you've completely ignored the issue, using an analogy about FCC-regulation of ownership of a broadcaster.
To be blunt, the broadcaster analogy is wholly inapposite for reasons that I *know* you understand -- ownership and restrictions on content on broadcast facilities was subject to FCC regulation (and thus to things like the Fairness Doctrine, bans on indecency, etc.) because of them being considered to operate on "public airwaves," a concept that doesn't apply to the internet.
Further, the argument for regulating or banning TikTok is dramatically WORSE than the argument for the restrictions on receiving foreign-created Communist propaganda that were struck down in Lamont. In that case, the issue was receiving copies of newspapers from Communist regimes. The content of those papers was obviously 100% created and selected by the Communist regimes and very little, if any of it, in any particular issue of the paper was created by American citizens. With TikToK, almost certainly the vast majority of the content on it is *not* created by the Chinese government and quite a bit of it is created by private American citizens. To put it another way, 100% of the content of Tass, People's Daily, etc. was generated by a Communist regime and selected for propaganda value, and there was no opportunity for anyone else to put any content in the newspaper. With TikTok, you have effectively an infinitely large "newspaper" that any user can contribute content to (including American citizens) and then the Chinese regime filters it pursuant to the TOS and chooses what order to display it in. While that's not the New England town square style of free speech, I can guarantee you there's dramatically more freedom in what people are posting to TikTok these days than what anyone was getting to publish in a Soviet or Communist Chinese newspaper in the 1960s!
What does banning Tik Tok look like? Preventing US based companies from including it on their app market? Or any company that wants to do business in the US has to remove it from their app market? Should phones comes with software that doesn't allow Tik Tok to be installed on US phones? Would we go after individual users who evade the ban to download Tik Tok? Would we check the phones of people visiting the US to make sure they don't use the app? Or would we ask US ISPs to block all access? China is unable to block access to social media platforms it finds unfavorable, what additional steps should the US government take so we can suppress this content?
To me the comparison to allowing the USSR to buy a broadcast station doesn't really fit. Tik Tok doesn't really need to own a single piece of infrastructure in the US to offer their service here. This seems more analogous to just banning movies or media that came from the USSR, which would primarily be a ban on what Americans can do, not a restriction on foreign corporations.
Wait, uh, what are we supposed to do about TikTok's ownership? Did that part get left out of the piece? The 'USSR buying a TV station' analogy doesn't work because China didn't buy anything here- they built a platform, and Americans are voluntarily using it. A closer analogy would be to the USSR broadcasting a cable news channel domestically, and Americans somehow picking up the signal.
We're an open society with some of the most robust free speech laws (and property) laws on the planet, we can't ban foreign platforms, and we probably can't make TikTok sell to an American company. There's literally no legal basis for any of this. Thompson's piece was terrible (he said that we should block TikTok on national security grounds, which would have been laughed out of court), and that was right around the time that I canceled my 5 year Stratechery membership. (Thompson became a Joe Rogan/Ben Shapiro fReE sPeEcH nut, except when he wanted to ban TikTok, then went back to 'content moderation is censorship').
I agree with some of the problems raised here, but again these are some of the problems that open societies face. To be constructive I guess if it could be proven that TikTok is amplifying Russian or Chinese propaganda the US could pressure its advertisers, which would probably change its behavior. But uh otherwise this piece is bad, and Thompson's piece was worse. Sad to see how quickly pundits get away from the values of a free society
Is it just me or is the problem here actually algorithmic curation of content? Like, if TikTok used the Twitter model of old (reverse-chronological feed of everything the people you follow posted) this wouldn’t be a problem. And this is the same dynamic as causes trouble at Facebook, and YouTube, and Twitter, and wherever else. Perhaps the real solution here is to make curation via algorithm in general just not an appealing business model.
This article is insufficiently boring in its take.
I work in this space (Content Moderation) and it's clear nobody who really does has been talked to.
"Would it be crazy to think they are putting their thumbs on the scale in favor of pro-Russian content?"
Yes.
ByteDance has US engineers and english moderators are not from China. Any demand like "censor Ukraine war would almost certainly immediately leak". Chinese ownership wouldn't survive, it's barely survived now and they haven't even done anything. That would be a very expensive one-time information control effort.
Some key points you are missing for a more boring explanation:
1) Human moderators / content labelers are mostly not American.
2) Human Video moderation is extra expensive because you have to watch the whole thing and extra hard to label right.
3) Read the details of the actual guardian article: The real objection is that it's NOT censoring "bad" Ukraine content. Study is highly misleading. (see below)
4) Chinese and US apps are effectively different apps (this is the case for pretty much everything).
5) You aren't seeing Chinese content moderations (no ghosts allowed). You ARE probably seeing everyone in the world not-China which != US/UK.
6) Different countries have radically different content standards especially for under 18. Some examples:
China: No ghosts. You can have up to 3 skeletons, but they have to be cute.
Germany: Naked people ok. Guns bad.
US: Naked people bad. Guns ok.
Saudi Arabia: different...
Ask yourself the boring question:
"Which country is any human moderator doing ENGLISH language content moderation / labeling likely to hail from?"
Answer: India.
Boring explanation:
(1) TikTok grew rapidly which typically means they didn't have time to localize moderation standards much beyond a China / not-China separation. And not China has a lot of variation that's hard to satisfy quickly and it's not just about the US.
(2) Not much human moderation / labeling going on.
(3) To the extent that it is: Indian Content Moderation has different cultural biases than US journalists / US Foreign policy types.
(4) Many US ByteDance engineers there likely feel active political censorship at scale (lets be clear that this is the ask) should be resisted even if there currently is a bit of "war hysteria" in the air.
Study Details:
The algorithm here is clearly just doing item-item similarity and returning things you like. If you watch a video all the way to the very end that means you REALLY REALLY like it. The researchers clearly set their "test" up to sucker gullible journalists by watching every video to the "very end".
It's as if Facebook let you click on the "like" button 10 times.
Basically they kept telling TikTok they REALLY REALLY like Ukraine "Disinfo" videos and were "surprised" it kept recommending similar videos.
This was a pretty bad piece, I usually expect better from Matt. I assume it is because Matt doesn't use TikTok. Imagine writing a long article about Twitter having only read other people's takes and studies on how often Ukraine misinformation was seen.
Under 30s probably have favorable views on Russia because they grew up in the '1980s called and want their foreign policy back' phase of liberal ideology. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1409sXBleg) The way the red scare and Cold War are taught in history classrooms and the politicization of views on Russia probably also contribute.
re: TikTok and the algorithm, I tend to agree that where the algorithms can be avoided, they should. I certainly hope Matt is doing his part and remembering to set his Twitter, Next-door, and Facebook to be chronological. This is a required step to making them not be hate machines, but the US platforms are tricky and like to periodically revert the setting (for engagement, obv).
The 'accountant' thing is a reference to a TikTok meme/trend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqdchLYNEPY Not a nefarious censorship thing. Something folks don't really seem to understand is that while FYP is heavily moderated for new recommendations, once you follow someone, TikTok will mix in content from the people you follow.
I agree that China shouldn't control a major US media platform, but acting like this is somehow China's fault is bizarre and gives a huge pass to US interests who caused this problem. Specifically Vine, and Twitter killing Vine, caused this problem by identifying a clear market need, then leaving it empty for nearly a decade. Something I wish people in the US understood is that we have a responsibility to be good at our jobs, compete vigorously, do good work, and make sure that we are putting forth competitive offerings such that we don't leave giant market gaps for Chinese competitors.
Imagine clutching pearls over China when US tech companies are 100% responsible for this situation. It's not the vibe.
There was an opportunity to intervene before TikTok became a big deal (think spring/summer 2019) but of course the US missed that. Had US leadership been effective, they could have gone to YouTube and Instagram and said, "Can you please make Reels/Shorts competitive ASAP and not wait until TikTok hits critical mass?" https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/10/style/what-is-tik-tok.html
Perhaps we could have also asked Facebook/Instagram/Twitter to make their algorithms not absolute dumpster fires of conflict and hate. TikTok is competitive because TikTok made a competitive product, and I'd like to see more emphasis on making something better than TikTok (surely if you believe in western values you agree it is possible) rather than trying to have the US government pick winners and losers. Doomscrolling is not a thing on TikTok.
I don’t know if anyone else has mentioned this, but it seems the whole problem with TikTok is that it is a fabulous video platform which became wildly successful while video platforms created by American firms like Facebook have been utter shite. TikTok apparently excels at ease-of-use while American attempts at video apps were clumsy and lacking in features. What happened to American technological ingenuity?
Matt’s argument here (which I’ve seen in others like Ben Thompson) is absurd and hypocritical. Even if TikTok's algorithm is 100% controlled by the PRC government, it competes freely and fairly in the open US market. It’s not a monopoly and has not abused its power in anti-competitive behaviors. Banning TikTok would be philosophically contradictory to not only our principles of free speech, but also that of market economy.
Matt’s argument is that we need to bubble wrap US citizens in US propaganda. Kevin Drum takes the next logical step and says that it needs to be center left bubble wrap and Fox News is the enemy. 1984 or a Brave New World or the animal farm book, one of those, had to warn that this is sort of a tricky subject.
I can't shake the feeling that this is like a deeply problematic standard. Like everything about the specifics of the case seem right, but like we seize your firm based on very little actual evidence other than well they're Chinese and probably are doing something bad.
They made a fundamentally excellent product that fills a completely different niche than home grown socials and now it's going to be taken from them. It doesn't seem like fair play even if everything about the case is correct. What firms could you not destroy under the evidentiary standard of we think they’re probably doing something bad?
I'm not sure what is to be done about it, but TikTok's algo is *scary* good at personalizing and maximizing engagement. Use it for a week and then think about it for a minute and it's basically the social media tech equivalent of those fantastical GPT3 word models or DALL-E pictures out of OpenAI. The tech they've made is genuinely disruptive, and their growth reflects that. Compound on that that we have little idea what levers the CCP is pushing on the backend, and purely from a consequentialist perspective, I'm pretty convinced that it should have been banned under pretty much whatever spurious pretext the State department lawyers could have ginned up.
The short and sweet of it is that we need a way to enshrine “reciprocity” into the legal code that allows us to treat firms from authoritarian nations pursuing whole-of-society strategies against us as fundamental threats or in the same manner as our firms in those countries are treated, depending on the specifics of what the firm is and does.
If that requires a Constitutional amendment to allow discrimination based on a firm’s ownership, so be it, it’d pass. But I’d prefer that legal precedent from the Cold War be drawn on.
More later on the China specifics below.
Did anyone else not get the email? (Yes I checked spam)
I'm up early most days feeding an infant and need my newsletters!
I would like a fuller reconciliation between the views in this post with the views in the misinformation post that went public just yesterday (https://www.slowboring.com/p/misinformation?s=r).
There's a disconnect that I'll simplistically and churlishly state as follows: "Misinformation is a made-up issue, stop with that nonsense. Except for TikTok, that one really is misinformation and is bad."
Matt, when I saw the headline I was very excited because I thought you would *finally* address the point that I've brought up to you on Twitter multiple times over the past two years whenever you talk about restricting TiKTok: there is a First Amendment right to consume foreign-created Communist propaganda. That was decided by the Supreme Court in Lamont v. Postmaster General, 381 US 301 (1965). (Here's a summary of the case: https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/848/lamont-v-postmaster-general ) Instead, you've completely ignored the issue, using an analogy about FCC-regulation of ownership of a broadcaster.
To be blunt, the broadcaster analogy is wholly inapposite for reasons that I *know* you understand -- ownership and restrictions on content on broadcast facilities was subject to FCC regulation (and thus to things like the Fairness Doctrine, bans on indecency, etc.) because of them being considered to operate on "public airwaves," a concept that doesn't apply to the internet.
Further, the argument for regulating or banning TikTok is dramatically WORSE than the argument for the restrictions on receiving foreign-created Communist propaganda that were struck down in Lamont. In that case, the issue was receiving copies of newspapers from Communist regimes. The content of those papers was obviously 100% created and selected by the Communist regimes and very little, if any of it, in any particular issue of the paper was created by American citizens. With TikToK, almost certainly the vast majority of the content on it is *not* created by the Chinese government and quite a bit of it is created by private American citizens. To put it another way, 100% of the content of Tass, People's Daily, etc. was generated by a Communist regime and selected for propaganda value, and there was no opportunity for anyone else to put any content in the newspaper. With TikTok, you have effectively an infinitely large "newspaper" that any user can contribute content to (including American citizens) and then the Chinese regime filters it pursuant to the TOS and chooses what order to display it in. While that's not the New England town square style of free speech, I can guarantee you there's dramatically more freedom in what people are posting to TikTok these days than what anyone was getting to publish in a Soviet or Communist Chinese newspaper in the 1960s!
This was right up there with buying Greenland as "actually good Trump ideas"
What does banning Tik Tok look like? Preventing US based companies from including it on their app market? Or any company that wants to do business in the US has to remove it from their app market? Should phones comes with software that doesn't allow Tik Tok to be installed on US phones? Would we go after individual users who evade the ban to download Tik Tok? Would we check the phones of people visiting the US to make sure they don't use the app? Or would we ask US ISPs to block all access? China is unable to block access to social media platforms it finds unfavorable, what additional steps should the US government take so we can suppress this content?
To me the comparison to allowing the USSR to buy a broadcast station doesn't really fit. Tik Tok doesn't really need to own a single piece of infrastructure in the US to offer their service here. This seems more analogous to just banning movies or media that came from the USSR, which would primarily be a ban on what Americans can do, not a restriction on foreign corporations.
Wait, uh, what are we supposed to do about TikTok's ownership? Did that part get left out of the piece? The 'USSR buying a TV station' analogy doesn't work because China didn't buy anything here- they built a platform, and Americans are voluntarily using it. A closer analogy would be to the USSR broadcasting a cable news channel domestically, and Americans somehow picking up the signal.
We're an open society with some of the most robust free speech laws (and property) laws on the planet, we can't ban foreign platforms, and we probably can't make TikTok sell to an American company. There's literally no legal basis for any of this. Thompson's piece was terrible (he said that we should block TikTok on national security grounds, which would have been laughed out of court), and that was right around the time that I canceled my 5 year Stratechery membership. (Thompson became a Joe Rogan/Ben Shapiro fReE sPeEcH nut, except when he wanted to ban TikTok, then went back to 'content moderation is censorship').
I agree with some of the problems raised here, but again these are some of the problems that open societies face. To be constructive I guess if it could be proven that TikTok is amplifying Russian or Chinese propaganda the US could pressure its advertisers, which would probably change its behavior. But uh otherwise this piece is bad, and Thompson's piece was worse. Sad to see how quickly pundits get away from the values of a free society
Is it just me or is the problem here actually algorithmic curation of content? Like, if TikTok used the Twitter model of old (reverse-chronological feed of everything the people you follow posted) this wouldn’t be a problem. And this is the same dynamic as causes trouble at Facebook, and YouTube, and Twitter, and wherever else. Perhaps the real solution here is to make curation via algorithm in general just not an appealing business model.
This article is insufficiently boring in its take.
I work in this space (Content Moderation) and it's clear nobody who really does has been talked to.
"Would it be crazy to think they are putting their thumbs on the scale in favor of pro-Russian content?"
Yes.
ByteDance has US engineers and english moderators are not from China. Any demand like "censor Ukraine war would almost certainly immediately leak". Chinese ownership wouldn't survive, it's barely survived now and they haven't even done anything. That would be a very expensive one-time information control effort.
Some key points you are missing for a more boring explanation:
1) Human moderators / content labelers are mostly not American.
2) Human Video moderation is extra expensive because you have to watch the whole thing and extra hard to label right.
3) Read the details of the actual guardian article: The real objection is that it's NOT censoring "bad" Ukraine content. Study is highly misleading. (see below)
4) Chinese and US apps are effectively different apps (this is the case for pretty much everything).
5) You aren't seeing Chinese content moderations (no ghosts allowed). You ARE probably seeing everyone in the world not-China which != US/UK.
6) Different countries have radically different content standards especially for under 18. Some examples:
China: No ghosts. You can have up to 3 skeletons, but they have to be cute.
Germany: Naked people ok. Guns bad.
US: Naked people bad. Guns ok.
Saudi Arabia: different...
Ask yourself the boring question:
"Which country is any human moderator doing ENGLISH language content moderation / labeling likely to hail from?"
Answer: India.
Boring explanation:
(1) TikTok grew rapidly which typically means they didn't have time to localize moderation standards much beyond a China / not-China separation. And not China has a lot of variation that's hard to satisfy quickly and it's not just about the US.
(2) Not much human moderation / labeling going on.
(3) To the extent that it is: Indian Content Moderation has different cultural biases than US journalists / US Foreign policy types.
(4) Many US ByteDance engineers there likely feel active political censorship at scale (lets be clear that this is the ask) should be resisted even if there currently is a bit of "war hysteria" in the air.
Study Details:
The algorithm here is clearly just doing item-item similarity and returning things you like. If you watch a video all the way to the very end that means you REALLY REALLY like it. The researchers clearly set their "test" up to sucker gullible journalists by watching every video to the "very end".
It's as if Facebook let you click on the "like" button 10 times.
Basically they kept telling TikTok they REALLY REALLY like Ukraine "Disinfo" videos and were "surprised" it kept recommending similar videos.
This was a pretty bad piece, I usually expect better from Matt. I assume it is because Matt doesn't use TikTok. Imagine writing a long article about Twitter having only read other people's takes and studies on how often Ukraine misinformation was seen.
Under 30s probably have favorable views on Russia because they grew up in the '1980s called and want their foreign policy back' phase of liberal ideology. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1409sXBleg) The way the red scare and Cold War are taught in history classrooms and the politicization of views on Russia probably also contribute.
re: TikTok and the algorithm, I tend to agree that where the algorithms can be avoided, they should. I certainly hope Matt is doing his part and remembering to set his Twitter, Next-door, and Facebook to be chronological. This is a required step to making them not be hate machines, but the US platforms are tricky and like to periodically revert the setting (for engagement, obv).
The 'accountant' thing is a reference to a TikTok meme/trend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqdchLYNEPY Not a nefarious censorship thing. Something folks don't really seem to understand is that while FYP is heavily moderated for new recommendations, once you follow someone, TikTok will mix in content from the people you follow.
I agree that China shouldn't control a major US media platform, but acting like this is somehow China's fault is bizarre and gives a huge pass to US interests who caused this problem. Specifically Vine, and Twitter killing Vine, caused this problem by identifying a clear market need, then leaving it empty for nearly a decade. Something I wish people in the US understood is that we have a responsibility to be good at our jobs, compete vigorously, do good work, and make sure that we are putting forth competitive offerings such that we don't leave giant market gaps for Chinese competitors.
Imagine clutching pearls over China when US tech companies are 100% responsible for this situation. It's not the vibe.
There was an opportunity to intervene before TikTok became a big deal (think spring/summer 2019) but of course the US missed that. Had US leadership been effective, they could have gone to YouTube and Instagram and said, "Can you please make Reels/Shorts competitive ASAP and not wait until TikTok hits critical mass?" https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/10/style/what-is-tik-tok.html
Perhaps we could have also asked Facebook/Instagram/Twitter to make their algorithms not absolute dumpster fires of conflict and hate. TikTok is competitive because TikTok made a competitive product, and I'd like to see more emphasis on making something better than TikTok (surely if you believe in western values you agree it is possible) rather than trying to have the US government pick winners and losers. Doomscrolling is not a thing on TikTok.
P.S. Matt's take on TikTok showing Ukraine disinformation is also bad; TikTok has shown me plenty of content that aligns with the pro-western view that Russia is committing atrocities and the Ukrainians are fighting in righteous self-defense of their sovereignty. I think Twitter is equally concerning here. https://mythoslabs.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Part-III-Analyzing-Twitter-Disinformation-and-Propaganda-Related-to-Russian-Aggression-Against-Ukraine.pdf
Today's comments:
10% "The damn paperboy is late again"
40% "Matt, you're crazy, this is totally unconstitutional"
40% "Matt, you're a crazy genius, just change the constitution"
10% "I saw the word 'teacher' and the word 'gender' and now I must vent my spleen unto the electro-ether lest I Hulk-out and ruin yet another outfit."
I don’t know if anyone else has mentioned this, but it seems the whole problem with TikTok is that it is a fabulous video platform which became wildly successful while video platforms created by American firms like Facebook have been utter shite. TikTok apparently excels at ease-of-use while American attempts at video apps were clumsy and lacking in features. What happened to American technological ingenuity?
Matt’s argument here (which I’ve seen in others like Ben Thompson) is absurd and hypocritical. Even if TikTok's algorithm is 100% controlled by the PRC government, it competes freely and fairly in the open US market. It’s not a monopoly and has not abused its power in anti-competitive behaviors. Banning TikTok would be philosophically contradictory to not only our principles of free speech, but also that of market economy.
Matt’s argument is that we need to bubble wrap US citizens in US propaganda. Kevin Drum takes the next logical step and says that it needs to be center left bubble wrap and Fox News is the enemy. 1984 or a Brave New World or the animal farm book, one of those, had to warn that this is sort of a tricky subject.
I can't shake the feeling that this is like a deeply problematic standard. Like everything about the specifics of the case seem right, but like we seize your firm based on very little actual evidence other than well they're Chinese and probably are doing something bad.
They made a fundamentally excellent product that fills a completely different niche than home grown socials and now it's going to be taken from them. It doesn't seem like fair play even if everything about the case is correct. What firms could you not destroy under the evidentiary standard of we think they’re probably doing something bad?
I'm not sure what is to be done about it, but TikTok's algo is *scary* good at personalizing and maximizing engagement. Use it for a week and then think about it for a minute and it's basically the social media tech equivalent of those fantastical GPT3 word models or DALL-E pictures out of OpenAI. The tech they've made is genuinely disruptive, and their growth reflects that. Compound on that that we have little idea what levers the CCP is pushing on the backend, and purely from a consequentialist perspective, I'm pretty convinced that it should have been banned under pretty much whatever spurious pretext the State department lawyers could have ginned up.