YouSaid · the spoken record

Molly Wood

lines on the record: 70
first: 2024-04-25
most recent: 2024-04-25
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“So, I want to come back to TikTok. We'll talk about what happens next and who I buy and all that sort of thing. But inside of this is a big question about what evidence lawmaker saw of something bad happening with TikTok and its ostensible Chinese control, other bad things that can happen on social media platforms, basically what scared them into banning TikTok. And I think the main thing is that there's an app like TikTok that became dominant in the United States. We have no federal restrictions on data collection or privacy or algorithmic recommendations for a variety of reasons. We don't have those things. And so those policy problems just run into each other. We've been talking about both those policy problems for years. We've been yelling at Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey until they turned into weird statues and then emerged from the statue as some sort of MMA fighter. None of that's fixed because we banned TikTok, right?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, I would take them at their word that they're going to present a legal challenge. This is an existential threat, so I don't see why they wouldn't. I think, you know, it remains to be seen what way they choose to go after that. But I think the ones that seem likely are they'll probably raise First Amendment issues with the law saying that their own First Amendment rights are being violated and its users that engage on the platform. And they also might say this is a bill of attainer. This is a piece of legislation that's targeting and singling us out as one company rather than a broad law that's applied to many companies. And the law does name byte dance and TikTok.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That's not a requirement. It's basically just they can't be owned by another company that's controlled by a foreign adversary. So they can't really sell to like, you know, a Russian company, for example. But, you know, they could sell to a European company. They could sell to a lot of different companies. But realistically, I think it's a decent bet that there's a lot of U.S. companies that would be the ones able to, you know, actually carry out this deal.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think there were basically two differences in terms of the substance. You know, one difference is just the mechanism that they chose to use to carry out this kind of idea of getting TikTok to either change its ownership structure or face a ban. The Trump administration was doing it under essentially just another statute. Then the second thing was the Trump administration was doing it through the executive branch. And in some ways, that's kind of inherently weaker than going through Congress. You know, courts are much more likely to uphold congressional action than executive action.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Like we've been in the circus before, and you know, the Trump years, there was a rumor that a Trump rally was sparsely attended because of a TikTok prank. No one knows that that was true, but then the follow-on rumor was that Trump heard this, he all mad on his plane coming home from the sparsely attended rally and said, I'm banning TikTok. And then there was a furious rush where Microsoft was going to buy it, or maybe Walmart was going to buy it. Then Oracle did Project Texas where they store the data. And maybe Oracle would buy it in the end. What's different between that time and this time?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I haven't really seen much from them. You know, I think they're probably just going to keep out of it if the government tells them you have to do this, then I think they're going to follow. But yeah, ultimately it's somewhat bite dance decision if they want to sell. And then, you know, if this bill is upheld, then yeah, the app store companies are going to have to follow the law.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“TikTok's parent company ByteDance would have this period of up to 12 months to divest TikTok in order to allow it to keep operating in the US. Otherwise, basically how this ban would take effect is that essentially app stores would not be able to distribute or update the app. So maybe you'll still have the app on your phone for a little bit if ByteDance chooses not to sell and the app is actually banned, but it's eventually not going to update. It's not going to really work after some period of time.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Let's talk about the actual mechanics of the build then. TikTok, again, they're saying this is a ban, listen to the lawmakers. They're saying it's a ban, make no mistake it's a ban. It's kind of up to them, right? I mean, the choices in front of them are sell the thing or shut it down. Like they have to choose, what is the bill actually do? What is the mechanism by which it will ban TikTok if that is the outcome?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Not really. I think that's the simple answer. We heard Senator Mark Warner, who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee on the floor yesterday saying, like, look, you know, we know a lot of young Americans really like this app, and we're not trying to ban it. want to have a different ownership structure because we think there are national security issues. And that's been the line from a lot of lawmakers who really do say that they are looking for a different ownership structure that they think will be in the interest of US national security. Now, you know, TikTok is saying that's not the case, and certainly there have been some lawmakers whose rhetoric kind of goes beyond that. And obviously that's what TikTok is pointing to. And they're making this an issue about free speech and free expression on their platform.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So it's a must pass bill. It gets layered into it. They kind of avoid the political fallout. But there is already fallout, right? Like TikTok is out there, the CEO of TikTok Chew is on the app saying we're going to fight this, we're going to file a lawsuit. They're trampling your rights. Do lawmakers seem phased by any of this?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Packaging bills together in this way is pretty common. Basically, there's two ways essentially that a bill can make it into law. And one way is the first way they tried to do it with TikTok, which was pass a standalone bill, have it go through both chambers on its own, and then have the president sign it. That's one way to do it, but obviously there's a lot of moving parts in there. It's pretty easy to just throw sand in the gears of any kind of step in that process. So, you know, we don't really see so many bills passing that way. What we often see is bills packaged together with some”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You've been at Capital Hill reporter for a long time. You know that Congress is wheeling and dealing at all times. For the person who isn't so much in the machinations of Congress, is this fair play? Is this a thing that is normal or is this banning TikTok as unpopular but providing aid to Ukraine and Israel is popular? So we're just going to slide it in under the table.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To pass this bill because it was just one piece of this enormous package of legislation. And because of that and because they extended the timeline for divestment to something that was more palatable to more lawmakers, it was able to pretty much sail through.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Back when the house passed the TikTok legislation as a standalone bill, I mean, that was the headline, right? Because that was the one piece of legislation that was on the table, kind of on its own, essentially, for an up or down vote. And it passed pretty overwhelmingly in the House. Then it went over to the Senate. And over there, some senators were really for this legislation and some were, you know, a little bit more non-committal. So it seemed like, you know, maybe this is just going to stall out. Maybe they'll just take a lot of time going through the legislative process and everyone will forget about it. And then the election will happen and it'll be way in the rear view mirror. But instead, what happened was the House decided to bundle this legislation with a foreign aid package. So that's money to allies that a lot of lawmakers really want to send. And so it really incentivized Congress.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Talk about the politics of this for one second. The House had passed a sort of straight up and down version of this ban a while ago. It went nowhere in the Senate. Biden said, I'll sign it if it hits my desk. Then they extended the timeline where they had to divest it or sell it to a year, right? It's nine months plus three months of discretionary time for whoever is president if there's momentum. What changed about the politics of it? Because the thing that really gets me is they passed a TikTok band today and none of them talked about it. Joe Biden is signing statement for the bill was all about aid to Ukraine and Israel and Gaza. Nothing about TikTok. No one seems to be focused on it. It's just like a thing they did in the background. What's going on with the politics of this?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, it definitely feels like everything in the tech policy world just turned upside down in the past week. Basically what happened is both chambers of Congress managed to pass this bill as part of a broader foreign aid package that would effectively ban TikTok unless its China-based parent company Bite Dance manages to sell it within a year. Saturday we got the house vote yesterday. We got the Senate vote and then this morning Biden signed it into law.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There is a lot to talk about. We started talking about this episode thinking we were going to talk about privacy legislation and the renewed momentum to pass a privacy bill and then the United States government went and banned TikTok along the way today, like earlier today, Joe Biden signed the bill that would force TikTok to sell, divest itself, or shut down. What is going on there? What happened last weekend to make this move so much faster? What does this bill actually say? What's the satisfact of things?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“us what it does. And does that make the platform ripe for things like election interference, influence operations, or other risks to democracy? At any point, Congress could turn its attention from banning one single app and pass federal privacy legislation or an algorithmic transparency law. Both of these ideas have been debated for years. There are even options. A federal privacy framework now has real momentum for the first time in a long time, in the form of something called the American Privacy Rights Act, or APRA, but the TikTok ban could complicate those efforts, and Congress has a lot of incentive to drag its feet during election year. This is a messy, complicated discussion that goes back years with lots of players and lots of drama. So to help break it down, I invited Verge Senior Policy Reporter Lauren Finer. Lauren has been closely covering the effort to ban TikTok for years now, and she's also watched Congress fail to pass meaningful privacy regulation for even longer. We're going to go over how we got here, what this means for TikTok, and efforts to pass new privacy legislation.”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Which did not want to stall yet more aid to overseas US allies, voted to approve the foreign aid package. And President Biden signed it into law Wednesday morning, an achievement that both sides of the aisle hailed as a victory. But the fight over TikTok is just beginning. This new bill kept intact the compromise that TikTok parent company Bite Dance could avoid a US ban by selling itself to another entity, but ByteDance's response to the bill is that it's a ban, no matter what anyone says, and that it will fight the US government in the court system. That fight could get drawn out and ugly. The TikTok drama is framed around China, but when you drill down, it really has a lot to do with privacy law. Or more specifically, the fact that the United States doesn't have one. Most of the concerns on TikTok are around its stewardship of personal data. What is the company doing with all of our data, and what ultimately is TikTok's true relationship to the Chinese government? On top of that, there's debate around something called algorithmic transparency. Why does TikTok show?”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And welcome to Decoder. I'm Neil Li Patel, editor in chief of the Verge. And Decoder is my show about big ideas and other problems. Today we're talking about the TikTok band, quote unquote, the TikTok band, the bill that will force TikTok to either sell itself or shut down in the United States. And we're going to talk about how years of congressional inaction on a federal privacy law helps lead us to this moment of apparent national panic about algorithmic social media generally and TikTok specifically. The law that Joe Biden signed that would force TikTok to either sell itself or shut down arrived with an almost shocking suddenness. The House of Representatives passed their version of the TikTok ban last weekend by stuffing it into a foreign aid package for Israel and Ukraine. That particular tactic of jamming sometimes totally unrelated legislation into a time-sensitive so-called must-pass bill is often the quickest way, or these days, the only way, to get something in front of both chambers of Congress and signed into law. And the strategy worked. Last Tuesday, the Senate”
2024-04-25 · Decoder with Nilay Patel · Why the TikTok ban won't solve the US's online privacy problems · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT