MLRD — 2 years ago(April 23, 2023 07:24 AM)

The popular Chinese social media app represents unwelcome competition to US tech monopolies – and this is the real reason for its latest US ban, argues KEITH LAMB
MONTANA law-makers have decided to ban TikTok, the popular app owned by the Chinese company ByteDance.
Now their decision will go to Montana’s Republican governor, Greg Gianforte, for consideration.
The argument for banning TikTok is based on several conspiracy theories. But the real conspiracy theory, which Montana has a role in, isn’t being reported.
The popular conspiracy theory narrative is that China will be able to spy on US citizens, propagandise them, and that China is even using TikTok to dumb down US citizens while the Chinese version of the app is used to edify China’s citizens.
First, the CIA has claimed there is no evidence that the Chinese government has access to US TikTok data.
Indeed, TikTok stores US data on servers based in Texas. As such, the reasoning for banning TikTok is based on made up hypothetical situations rather than factual evidence.
Second, it is vacuous to claim that China is using TikTok to propagandise US citizens as US TikTok users overwhelmingly consume homegrown content.
Banning TikTok would only mean US content creators would migrate to different apps — this is probably the intention.
In terms of the Chinese version of TikTok, an episode of 60 Minutes argued that TikTok is more likely to show edifying content to Chinese youth while US children get the dumbed-down version.
Thus, the reasoning goes that China is purposely dumbing down Americans!
This dumbed-down argument speaks volumes to the ignorance that masks the real causes for seeking to ban TikTok.
Any serious self-reflection on popular US culture would recognise that it has long been dumbed down before TikTok’s advent.
Ignorance and mindless hedonism combined with quick wealth added onto a catchy jingle, has long been the background melody that big business has used to propagandise US youth.
Without widespread ignorance arguments that combine multiple foreign invasions with notions of “democracy” and “the good guys” would be untenable.
In contrast, China, when it comes to its youth, recognising the power of technology and media, does have stricter regulations.
Minors are restricted by law in their consumption of online computer games. Technology should be edifying and not just a tool for corporations to make a quick buck.
The contradictions are evident. China has a more edifying version of TikTok because the Chinese government acts democratically on behalf of its citizens.
However, in the US China can’t control TikTok’s content which is precisely what TikTok’s detractors are accusing China of.
The job of governing US tech media, for the public good, should be that of the US government.
However, homegrown tech monopolies that fund the US government would take offence and claim freedom of expression and the free market is being interfered with by an “authoritarian” government.
The real conspiracy is that TikTok, which is now the most popular downloaded app in the US, competes with US tech monopolies. Consequently the cloak of “free competition” is being discarded and underhand political means are being used to protect monopoly power.
One only needs to look at donations to the US presidential 2020 elections to understand that big business is calling the shots.
Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, and Netflix all donated between $21 to $5 million across both parties.
Absent from this large-scale election funding was ByteDance which, according to OpenSecrets, didn’t even donate $20,000 across both parties in 2020, though CNBC recently reported that since then ByteDance has spent $13 million lobbying the federal government.
Perhaps this is too little, too late and at any rate, they can’t compete with the collective power of US tech.
The problem with TikTok isn’t that it is controlled by China, it’s that it’s not “one of them.”
The US government is close to Facebook et al and they have all the information they need regarding US citizens, the problem is they, much like the Chinese government, don’t have access to TikTok’s US data.
Furthermore, TikTok isn’t hostile to China. It won’t be joining the tech funding of anti-China think tanks such as the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
If TikTok is eaten up or banned then these monopolies will feast on the windfall of content creators moving to their platforms, the competition for in-demand developers would be eased, and a free-market competitor would be removed.
So what does all this have to do with quiet Montana, far from Silicon Valley?
Capitalists not only fund politics, they are increasingly politicians too — as we saw with Donald Trump.
Gianforte, Montana’s governor, is a former software engineer and founder of the cloud service company RightNow Technologies.
His successful business was sold to the Texas-based US tech giant Oracle for a cool $1.5 billion in 2011.
Oracle was the third-largest software compan