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Comment by henryfjordan | Hacker News Reader

If social media is so bad let's regulate ALL of it, US firms included.

Personally I fear US-controlled social media more than Sino-controlled ones. It's not like the CCP can come and arrest me here in the US, or really use my data against me in any way. Both have plenty of reasons to throw propaganda at me, or censor certain viewpoints.

At least when it's a foreign country I have a chance of seeing through it, compared to so many domestic media sources currently licking Trump's feet. I'm supposed to feel secure that they'll be telling me the truth over the next 4 years? Acting in my interest?

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I understand the sentiment, and in the short term I agree with you (what can a foreign-controlled tik-tok going to do to us?). But think giving influence to our online behavior directly over to an adversarial foreign-power doesn't sound like a good idea. To me, it reminds me of WWII and the codebreakers in England who broke the German codes. They didn't use it to decode messages all time, because they didn't want to alert the Germans, only during significant events. Yeah, control over a major social media outlet could be a tool to use selectively during important events to influence the masses. Not in a good idea in my opinion, but am no expert in this.

That's fair. I do think China would probably just omit viewpoints rather than outright lie and it'd be hard to detect.

I guess I don't personally fear China as much as Congress does, I view them more as a rival than an enemy. I wish them well, and hope they make more cool apps and games for me to enjoy. And they'd probably love nothing more than for us to overthrow our oligarchs (just like we want to see the fall of the CCP), and that's not necessarily against my interests as a regular Joe.

I can understand why Congress is concerned, I just wish they'd try to address the root of the problem (enforce common safety and transparency standards for all social media) rather than the targeted approach they've taken.

Ah true that, congress (and the law) definitely isn't very consistent in their enforcement, nor well thought-out.

And actually, didn't fear China, but the invasion of Taiwan is becoming more and more real. A bit scary.

meta also cannot arrest you here in the US. we should maintain tighter controls on the state's use of data and access thereto because it's the entity we've given a monopoly on violence. that is the appropriate point for controls to be applied.

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