What do you think of video-sharing app TikTok?

I think it should be banned and removed from the Apple Store

It’s hurting society, especially the younger generations; we were already living in a competitive world and this is making it 1000x worse; it’s redefining the meaning of being cool, pretty, successful, interesting in a bad, unrealistic way; on a personal note, I downloaded the app (I was curious about it), and I feel like I’ve lost some brain cells because of that…; yes, it’s entertainment, but it’s bad entertainment. Leave it to China; the world doesn’t need this.

Leave it to China; the world doesn’t need this.

In China, the content shown to kids on TikTok is entirely different - science and education based: https://www.deseret.com/2022/11/24/23467181/difference-between-tik-tok-in-china-and-the-us

TikTok is just another part of the social media landscape. I don't see why people are so annoyed by such things. Social Media seems to have slotted in to the list of stuff that older people consider a threat to the social order: Votes for women, socialism, radio, TV, Rock'n'Roll, Elvis gyrating his hips. Lighten up. It's not compulsory. Most posters here repeatedly state that they never use any social media, despite this commenting forum qualifying as social media.

Any site or app that does something well at the right time can grab their piece of the action until the trends move on. That's the way tech works. And every generation of kids has their own thing to grow up with and learn from making mistakes on. Skateboards and ecstasy were far more dangerous.

As for the CCP spying on you. Ask yourself, seriously, would a spy agency in Beijing with a finite staff and finite budget, really be that interested in me or you? Besides, your own spooks - GCHQ, the NSA etc - are all running automated surveillance on net content, and your ISP will be logging every site you go to. If the internet didn't exist, the CIA would have invented it. Even without TikTok, you have zero privacy online.

your ISP will be logging every site you go to.

Anyone not using a VPN these days is asking to be tracked.

Many browsers prevent tracking.

Many browsers prevent tracking.

No, not really. There are a few browsers that are better for protecting you, and only TOR really stops it altogether, but with an extremely degraded user experience as a result. Brave is a little better than most browsers. But a browser alone, with the exception of TOR, cannot block tracking by your ISP, even on private mode. A VPN, changing the DNS servers, and using DNS over HTTPS are required to protect from your ISP tracking you. And unless you block scripts from being loaded on 3rd party domains, companies like FB themselves can track which sites you are visiting, even if you don't have a FB account.

Strangeland

I suggest you try Epic on your PC. You can even select a range of VPNs in various countries. With smartphones try the new Firefox Focus.

Epic blocks IP addresses currently it says I'm in the UK.

Not really worry about my IP.

I suggest you try Epic on your PC. You can even select a range of VPNs in various countries. With smartphones try the new Firefox Focus.

I pay for a VPN (Private Internet Access), and I used Firefox heavily customized to block 3rd party scripts, use DNS over HTTPS, and keep separate cookies per domain, and I use a private DNS server. I'm not worried about my own privacy.

I don't pay for a VPN and I don't worry about my privacy too.

In China, the content shown to kids on TikTok is entirely different - science and education based: https://www.deseret.com/2022/11/24/23467181/difference-between-tik-tok-in-china-and-the-us

Great link and Tristan Harris is very credible:

“It’s almost like they recognize that technology is influencing kids’ development, and they make their domestic version a spinach version of TikTok, while they ship the opium version to the rest of the world,” Tristan Harris, a former Google employee, and advocate for social media ethics, said of China’s approach to TikTok.

Opium War analogies aside, China's capitalist command economy has an aim of AI supremacy that is highly dangerous.

Regardless of TikTok’s low IQ contents, but first of all I wouldn’t recommend installing and using a potential Chinese spy tool on any IT equipment nowadays.

I think it should be banned and removed from the Apple Store

I forbid my kids to use it, absolutely not!

I think it should be banned and removed from the Apple Store

I forbid my kids to use it, absolutely not!

Good on you!

I think it's terrible.

I see it (tiktok) as being a color within all paintings (social media).

It’s reducing both the attention span & the intelligence of humans.