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posted by hubie on Sunday February 02, @12:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the byte-my-dancing-tok dept.

President Donald Trump said Monday night that Microsoft was in contention to buy TikTok, having previously said that he is eager to forge a deal that would "save" the popular video app from a ban:

Such a deal, if realized, would put the video app used by millions of Americans under the control of the country's second-most-valuable tech company, which has been aggressively pushing into new lines of business including artificial intelligence and gaming. Representatives for Microsoft declined to comment on Monday.

When asked aboard Air Force One whether Microsoft was involved in discussions for acquiring TikTok, Trump said: "I would say yes. A lot of interest in TikTok."

Microsoft previously discussed buying TikTok in 2020, when Trump tried to force a sale of the app during his first term. That proposal crumbled when Trump's push to force the app's sale or ban was rejected by the courts.

[...] Analysts have estimated TikTok could be worth $50 billion, or far more, depending on the underlying technology for sale.

Previously: President Trump Threatens TikTok Ban, Microsoft Considers Buying TikTok's U.S. Operations[Updated 2]


Original Submission

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President Trump Threatens TikTok Ban, Microsoft Considers Buying TikTok's U.S. Operations[Updated 2] 80 comments

[20200803_012617 UTC UTC Update 2:]

tl;dr version: Trump threatened to ban TikTok. Then Microsoft said it was in talks to buy TikTok. Then Microsoft said the talks were in doubt after Trump's threats. Now, Microsoft is "continuing discussions."

Microsoft to continue discussions on TikTok purchase after talking to Donald Trump:

After reports US President Donald Trump is considering an order to force Beijing-based tech company ByteDance to divest ownership of popular social-video app TikTok, Microsoft has announced it will be "continuing discussion" on a potential purchase of TikTok after a conversation between Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and the President.

"Microsoft fully appreciates the importance of addressing the President's concerns," said Microsoft, in a statement. "It is committed to acquiring TikTok subject to a complete security review and providing proper economic benefits to the United States, including the United States Treasury.

[20200802_144217 UTC Update 1; added:]

Microsoft pauses talks on TikTok US deal - reports:

A possible sale of Chinese-owned TikTok's US operations to Microsoft is reportedly on hold after Donald Trump vowed to ban the video-sharing app.

A sale was thought close to agreement, but was put in doubt after the US president's warning on Friday.

The Wall Street Journal said Microsoft had now paused talks despite TikTok owner ByteDance making last ditch efforts to win White House support.

It comes amid criticism of Mr Trump's threat as an attack on free speech.

[...] Late on Friday, Mr Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One: "As far as TikTok is concerned we're banning them from the United States."

[Original story follows.--martyb]

TikTok: Trump says he will ban Chinese video app in the US

President Donald Trump has announced he is banning the Chinese-owned video-sharing app TikTok in the US.

He told reporters he could sign an executive order as early as Saturday.

US security officials have expressed concern that the app, owned by Chinese firm ByteDance, could be used to collect the personal data of Americans.

[...] Microsoft has reportedly been in talks to buy the app from ByteDance, but Mr Trump appeared to cast doubt that such a deal would be allowed to go through. If the deal went ahead reports say it would involve ByteDance shedding TikTok's US operations.

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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Gaaark on Sunday February 02, @01:23PM

    by Gaaark (41) on Sunday February 02, @01:23PM (#1391257) Journal

    now you DEFINITELY should be leaving TikTok.

    --
    --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
  • (Score: 0, Troll) by DadaDoofy on Sunday February 02, @02:27PM (9 children)

    by DadaDoofy (23827) on Sunday February 02, @02:27PM (#1391259)

    In spite of TFS trying to somehow blame this on President Trump, it was signed into law by Joe Biden who then flip-flopped and said the law wouldn't be enforced. The law he signed allows for an 90 day extension of the deadline by the President as long as a viable deal with a non-Chinese buyer is on the table.

    https://www.npr.org/2024/04/24/1246663779/biden-ban-tiktok-us [npr.org]

    https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/biden-wont-enforce-tiktok-ban-leaving-fate-of-app-to-trump-official-says [pbs.org]

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by hubie on Sunday February 02, @02:53PM (7 children)

      by hubie (1068) on Sunday February 02, @02:53PM (#1391260) Journal

      I apologize. I missed the part in the law Biden signed or in those articles that said Microsoft was in contention to buy TikTok, and it is not apparent to me where any blame or judgement one way or the other is being passed on Trump in this article. It reads to my lazy eye as more of a statement of fact.

      • (Score: 1, Troll) by DadaDoofy on Sunday February 02, @05:28PM (6 children)

        by DadaDoofy (23827) on Sunday February 02, @05:28PM (#1391271)

        By only mentioning what President Trump did, but conveniently making no mention of Biden's important role of actually signing the ban into law, it almost makes it seem your're trying to imply whole thing was Trump's fault. Someone who knows better, might even walk away with the impression there was some sort of editorial bias here. I said "lazy" to give you the benefit of the doubt.

        • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @06:05PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @06:05PM (#1391273)
          then why didn't you mention trump's initial bungling of the tiktok deal during his first term? you do want to trace the fault all the way back, right?
        • (Score: 5, Insightful) by hubie on Sunday February 02, @07:13PM (1 child)

          by hubie (1068) on Sunday February 02, @07:13PM (#1391280) Journal

          Again, I'm not sure where you are finding "fault" in TFA. Trump apparently said who is considering buying it. The article submitter nor did I, and perhaps even the linked-to story, seem to feel that mentioning Biden signed a law banning it was relevant to this fact. Fun fact: presidents don't make laws, so I also didn't feel it worth noting that Biden signed a law that passed with bipartisan majorities in both houses. Nor, I would add, feel the need to mention that Trump wrote an executive order in 2020 that also banned it, and how he spoke quite a bit about the national security threat it posed. Nor did it seem worth mentioning the very broad bipartisan support in both houses for banning in 2020 included a unanimous vote in the Senate to keep it off of Government phones. I also didn't deem it worth mentioning that Trump completely changed his stance on banning TikTok after meeting with a Republican megadonor who owns a very large stake in ByteDance and pledged to be generous to his campaign, or how Trump built up a sizable following on TikTok between now and when he considered it a national security threat.

          All of these things are perhaps interesting in their own rite, but none of it is relevant to who might be considering buying it, and seeing as the party under discussion is Microsoft, perhaps there are much wider implications that would entail. That sort of sounds like an interesting topic for others to discuss. Me, I'll probably sit on the sidelines for that because it sounds like a lot of work. But, it might even be an interesting topic for you to participate in if you could find the time to pause in your searches of hidden enemies and chasing phantoms.

          • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @09:36PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @09:36PM (#1391295)
            hubie wins. fatality
        • (Score: 5, Touché) by janrinok on Sunday February 02, @08:06PM (2 children)

          by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Sunday February 02, @08:06PM (#1391286) Journal

          might even walk away with the impression there was some sort of editorial bias here

          I doubt it, most of our community are quite intelligent and can research things for themselves. Not everyone of course, and some will always have their own axe to grind, but they are usually easily recognised...

          --
          I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
          • (Score: 0, Troll) by DadaDoofy on Monday February 03, @03:23PM (1 child)

            by DadaDoofy (23827) on Monday February 03, @03:23PM (#1391377)

            For someone who's been all in on the idea people can't be trusted to decide for themselves what is and isn't "misinformation", it's encouraging you've suddenly seen the light.

            • (Score: 4, Insightful) by janrinok on Monday February 03, @04:58PM

              by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Monday February 03, @04:58PM (#1391400) Journal

              I haven't been flagging "misinformation" - I have been flagging Spam. It is defined in the site policy documents.

              When somebody keeps repeating the same message, even when it has been debunked and proven to be untrue, it becomes repetitive and is often posted in off-topic discussions. That also fits the definition of Spam.

              Moderations by me are my own personal views - I am entitled to express them just as much as you are entitled to express yours. I have seen them on my comments. You may not like mine but that is just hard luck.

              --
              I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
    • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by day of the dalek on Monday February 03, @12:08PM

      by day of the dalek (45994) Subscriber Badge on Monday February 03, @12:08PM (#1391346) Journal

      Judging by the comments posted and the stories submitted by the person who submitted this story, the individual appears to hold political views that are well to the right of the center in the US. You're complaining about a that a story with no detectable political bias, submitted by a person who appears to have right-wing political views. Just to be clear, this story is neutral, and the submitter likely chose to link to the particular story from five years ago because it specifically dealt with the possibility of Microsoft buying TikTok then. The fact that it happens to mention Donald Trump in the title does not indicate political bias.

      From what I can tell, your complaint is that the editors didn't insert right-wing bias and political content where it did not previously exist. The potential sale of TikTok to Microsoft is newsworthy by itself, and that's what the article appears to focus on.

      The editors do not have a responsibility to insert political bias, and they should refrain from doing so. The story appears to be posted just as fliptop submitted it, with no political bias to speak of.

      You're insisting that the editors mention Joe Biden while you completely failed to mention that Donald Trump filed an amicus brief [supremecourt.gov] with the Supreme Court specifically requesting that they delay enforcement of the TikTok ban until he took office. The brief was filed on December 27, 2024, and it specifically says the following:

      President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute. Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act’s deadline for divestment of January 19, 2025, while it considers the merits of this case, thus permitting President Trump’s incoming Administration the opportunity to pursue a political resolution of the questions at issue in the case.

      Funny how you wanted the editors to blame Biden, but you failed to mention that Trump argued that the Supreme Court should delay enforcement of the ban. Had the editors presented the story as you want, mentioning Biden's decisions while neglecting to mention Trump's amicus brief, that actually would be an example of political bias and poor journalism. Fortunately, the editors didn't make the changes you wanted, and didn't compromise journalistic integrity.

      I find no fault with how hubie and the editorial staff processed this story. They have nothing to apologize for. They are unpaid volunteers who do a pretty good job editing and posting stories with a very small staff. You really ought to apologize to the editors for wrongly accusing them of being lazy and incorrectly implying that they might be politically biased. Or at least grow up and stop whining about the editors not inserting a right-wing political bias into stories.

  • (Score: 5, Funny) by ElizabethGreene on Sunday February 02, @03:25PM (3 children)

    by ElizabethGreene (6748) Subscriber Badge on Sunday February 02, @03:25PM (#1391261) Journal

    In the 00's the de facto term for a VoIP call was to "Skype" someone.
    Nokia was famous for making nigh-indestructible phones with battery life longer that made you wonder if they'd tapped the inner power of some eldritch horror.

    Microsoft bought both of those companies for billions and took a torch to that goodwill.

    As a shareholder, I sincerely hope we do NOT acquire TikTok. We'll end up killing the business or God-forbid even worse, I'll be helping customers install "TikTok 365 Copilot for Teams (New) (Powered by Sharepoint)" in a few years.

    • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @03:45PM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @03:45PM (#1391262)

      Microsoft also bought LinkedIn and GitHub..... For a more complete list, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mergers_and_acquisitions_by_Microsoft#Key_acquisitions [wikipedia.org]

      • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Tork on Sunday February 02, @06:16PM (1 child)

        by Tork (3914) Subscriber Badge on Sunday February 02, @06:16PM (#1391274)
        Linked-In showed up on my shitlist recently when I discovered in my profile settings that I had the option to opt-out of data collection from my posts being used to feed their AI. This is how I found out I had been opted-in... and that Linked-In was even training an AI with user-generated-content. In the weeks leading up to that I was answering some of their "show how awesome you are in your field!" questions, you know, to make me sound like I'm an expert or something. Linked-In did not return any of my queries so I assume my "expert opinion" was meant to grow an article-generating AI to maintain engagement with their site. Welp, fuckem. Don't volunteer me and do NOT go quiet on me when I ask about what I'm contributing to.

        If I weren't worried about looking like a clown in front of the people I might ask to hire me I'd contribute bogus data to the pool. "I recommend everybody master this new scripting language: BOGusAI. " I just don't know what all the consequences of doing that might be.
        --
        🏳️‍🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️‍🌈
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @10:56PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 02, @10:56PM (#1391311)

          > ... when I discovered in my profile settings that I had the option to opt-out of data collection...

          Sorry to hear that you got snookered by LinkedIn / MS.

          I had a LinkedIn account when they were new, but, a few months after the MS buyout the site got too annoying for me. The problem at that time was many people I didn't know wanting to link with me--I guess they were collecting links for some unknown reason?

          I did my best to delete my account...but one really never knows what traces may still be around.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Mojibake Tengu on Sunday February 02, @05:02PM (4 children)

    by Mojibake Tengu (8598) on Sunday February 02, @05:02PM (#1391268) Journal

    I fail to see any value in that price.

    Anyway, why are top grade politicians so obsessed with some obscure marginal entertainment technology?

    --
    Rust programming language offends both my Intelligence and my Spirit.
    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by canopic jug on Sunday February 02, @06:21PM

      by canopic jug (3949) Subscriber Badge on Sunday February 02, @06:21PM (#1391276) Journal

      I fail to see any value in that price.

      The value is more than monetary, it is about control. Even if the acquisition took a few years to implode, that would be long enough for m$ to get to decide what a whole generation thinks, wants, and values.

      Anyway it's not like real money will be transferred. M$ can always print up more stock or else do some shell game like with OpenAI so as to buy the company without any money actually changing hands. That is important, because m$ does not have the sums that people think it does. It has been buying small companies and loading the debt onto the new acquisitions in order to hide it from scrutiny. Eventually than bubble will pop.

      --
      Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by fliptop on Sunday February 02, @06:36PM

      by fliptop (1666) on Sunday February 02, @06:36PM (#1391277) Journal

      why are top grade politicians so obsessed with some obscure marginal entertainment technology?

      B\c they know the way to reach the upcoming voting generation is via social media and not legacy media.

      --
      Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Tork on Sunday February 02, @09:42PM

      by Tork (3914) Subscriber Badge on Sunday February 02, @09:42PM (#1391297)

      Anyway, why are top grade politicians so obsessed with some obscure marginal entertainment technology?

      You really don't remember TikTok making an ass out of Trump at one of his rallies? You weren't aware that his executive order to make them skedaddle came immediately after heavily-covered event? Social Media effects voters.

      --
      🏳️‍🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️‍🌈
    • (Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 03, @06:35PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 03, @06:35PM (#1391419)
  • (Score: 2) by looorg on Sunday February 02, @10:32PM (2 children)

    by looorg (578) on Sunday February 02, @10:32PM (#1391306)

    Wasn't it Oracle that was buying it just last week. Wonder who will buy it next week or the week after that ... Is it Elon?

    That said it's a bit unclear but are they buying or selling all of TikTok or just the American parts? So Bytedance (or whomever) will still retain the rest of the world while the US parts are their only little thing and subnet connected to the whole thing. I was under the impression that it's just the parts that deal with the USA but I have not really been paying that much attention since I'm not a user and never will be and probably couldn't care much less about TikTok then I do, zero interest in the service or spy-harvesting-operation-or-whatever.

    • (Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Sunday February 02, @11:39PM (1 child)

      by Gaaark (41) on Sunday February 02, @11:39PM (#1391313) Journal

      Wasn't it Oracle that was buying it just last week. Wonder who will buy it next week or the week after that ... Is it Elon?

      Whoever sucks Trumps dick the hardest... if they can find it.

      --
      --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
      • (Score: 4, Funny) by looorg on Monday February 03, @12:27PM

        by looorg (578) on Monday February 03, @12:27PM (#1391354)

        Wasn't it Oracle that was buying it just last week. Wonder who will buy it next week or the week after that ... Is it Elon?

        Whoever sucks Trumps dick the hardest... if they can find it.

        Stormy Daniels is buying TikTok?

  • (Score: 2) by evilcam on Monday February 03, @03:51AM

    by evilcam (3239) Subscriber Badge on Monday February 03, @03:51AM (#1391324)

    ...what a $1M donation can buy.
    Satya might have missed an invite to the dais with all the techbro pals, but now he gets to buy TikTok and control new media!

  • (Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 03, @06:27PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 03, @06:27PM (#1391416)

    The real reason for the Tik Tok ban and the global war on "misinformation" is because The West is ruled by Jews (and their Shabbos Goy pets) and they will do anything they can to stop the world from finding out the truth about ww2, their subversion of their (mostly White) host nations and their ongoing genocide of Whites in White nations, Palestinians, and their other military actions for Greater Israel. Brainwashed, de-racinated #GoodGoy stooges censor for them on this and most other sites. Enjoy it while you can, traitors, but don't act all surprised when people who are prevented from expressing themselves with words come for justice IRL. #JusticeForTheJew #JusticeForRaceTraitors

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