Huawei 2.0. We can't compete so we will just ban the competition. A story as old as American industry.

While I’m sure the protectionist aspect was appealing to some legislators and industry players, there really are security concerns with building a country’s communications infrastructure out of components made by a not-very-friendly rival who’s sure to use it for spying in peace times and who knows what in hostile times.

The US should know :)

To be fair, China's bans on Google et al. make this somewhat retaliatory, not purely anticompetitive.

I don't think it's quite the same thing, is it? I mean, Google isn't banned, they just can't/won't fulfill all the demands by the CCP. The end result is the same, but it's the difference between "you're not allowed to open a bar" and "you're not allowed to open a bar without getting a license and obeying the laws".

The problem with TikTok is that it seems to do nothing that domestic US companies don't do, so it's perfectly legal. Outlawing the problematic aspect of social media would essentially destroy Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and severely damage Youtube, so they need to make it a real ban on the company, not the company's practices.

> Outlawing the problematic aspect of social media would essentially destroy Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and severely damage Youtube, so they need to make it a real ban on the company, not the company's practices.

I wonder if we would be okay with removing algorithmic feeds/recommendations. Feeds must either be a chronological order of content or it must be a human editor selected assortment of content. Leave room for algorithmic spam/malware blocking.

I honestly think that leaves Facebooks/Twitter/Reddit/Youtube in operation, although more layoffs might be required.

It would be interesting to see if they'd remain attractive to people if there was no engagement optimization and controversial-first ordering. If you don't get your daily dose of outrage because you've slept while the hot post was submitted and three hours later, it has been pushed down already -- do you not just move on at some point?

The older social media platforms were quite popular and successful before they were outcompeted by the more algorithmic rage machines

As a foreigner and commenting this in good faith ... the country who saw birth Facebook, Google, Instagram... well actually created the Internet as we know it... can't produce an alternative to an app that just shows small videos sorted by an algorithm? What is going on with you guys?