4min chapter

Net Assessment cover image

Better Burden Sharing With Allies

Net Assessment

CHAPTER

The Unfair Treatment of TikTok in the United States

Zachary: I am so sick of Chinese officials claiming that TikTok's treatment in the United States is so unfair because China would never treat an American technology company that way. He says he was impressed with General Millie, who did an interview with my friend Mark Hannah on one of his other favorite podcasts. Zuckerman: The schizophrenic way in which the invitations were handed out where Hungary and Turkey aren't coming and maybe understandably, but invited are Pakistan and Mexico.

00:00
Speaker 3
Speaking of things that don't make sense, TikTok. I am so sick of Chinese officials claiming that TikTok's treatment in the United States is so unfair because China would never treat an American technology company that way, right? Like just look at Facebook and Twitter and YouTube, which all operate normally in China. Oh, wait, they don't, because they haven't basically been allowed to operate there at all. And yet it's totally unfair for the United States to ask questions and hearing of the TikTok CEO, who, oh, by the way, did a pretty terrible job in multiple ways, but also being like fairly disingenuous in some of his answers. You know, look, at the end of the day, TikTok is sending data back to China because its algorithm is built in China. And the only way that that's ever going to stop is essentially for TikTok to be fully separated from ByteDance, the company that owns it in China. And I think that's just the reality of the world. And let's be honest, that's essentially what the Chinese would require of any major tech company that had this kind of access on Chinese user data, right? So you know, yes, Apple sells phones in China, but guess what? You know where all that data is stored? It's stored in China on servers that are encrypted so that the Chinese Communist Party can read whatever it wants on its user data for all of its users in China. Well, you know, it's not crazy that the US is trying to force divestment of TikTok from ByteDance given that, you know, the Chinese have never let us have access to their own market for similar companies. And I'm so sick of them saying that this is somehow unfair when they've been doing this for literally 20 years.
Speaker 2
I thought the best part was when the executive said, well, I wouldn't say we're spying. And Connor Bryan said, maybe you should have worked
Speaker 3
shop to different answer.
Speaker 2
My grievances with the summit for democracy part two, not just the schizophrenic way in which the invitations were handed out where Hungary and Turkey aren't coming and maybe understandably, but invited is Pakistan and also Mexico, which is having its own struggles with democracy right now. It's just once again, this dividing line that just is the continual theme in the Biden foreign policy. I get that we want to support democracy, but when we divide things up in a rather random and haphazard manner, when we continually make this claim about the values that we have, and then we go around the world making exceptions for countries that are necessary to our interests or perhaps valuable to our interests. It just seems to be inconsistent. And so while I appreciate some of the work that obviously is done behind the scenes, making this such a prominent theme and hinging so much on it publicly just seems like a problem to me. Okay, Chris, you're out of boy.
Speaker 1
My out of this week is an out of general goes out to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Millie, who did an interview with my friend Mark Hannah on one of my other favorite podcasts, a none of the above. Mostly I was impressed. Well, first of all, I was impressed that General Millie did the interview in the first place, although Mark's had a pretty good run lately in the New York Times and on Morning Joe and all other sorts of things. But I really encourage you to listen to this interview. I thought General Millie was very candid. Mostly was focused on the war in Ukraine, but there were other discussions pertaining to civil military relations and things like that, which of course we've discussed on this show before. I really, I just really liked it in a sober and sensible. And so I recommend it. I'll include a link in the show notes. Great.
Speaker 2
Okay, Zach.

Get the Snipd
podcast app

Unlock the knowledge in podcasts with the podcast player of the future.
App store bannerPlay store banner

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode

Save any
moment

Hear something you like? Tap your headphones to save it with AI-generated key takeaways

Share
& Export

Send highlights to Twitter, WhatsApp or export them to Notion, Readwise & more

AI-powered
podcast player

Listen to all your favourite podcasts with AI-powered features

Discover
highlights

Listen to the best highlights from the podcasts you love and dive into the full episode