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Wasn't there something about how you couldn't find TikTok videos about the Hong Kong protests? Ahh, so the Guardian had some leaked moderation documents[1] imp
by karaterobot 5y ago
Wasn't there something about how you couldn't find TikTok videos about the Hong Kong protests?
Ahh, so the Guardian had some leaked moderation documents[1] implying there was an active moderation keeping them from being viewed. Buzzfeed said they did their own experiments and found no evidence that videos about Hong Kong were being removed[2].
I see no reason why both of those can't be true: if you control the algorithm, you don't need to delete anything, you can control with fine granularity how viral it's allowed to go. I guess that's a conspiracy theory, but for myself, I'm very skeptical that any media company operates in China with what most of us would call political neutrality and free speech.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-how-tiktok-censors-videos-that-do-not-please-beijing https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-...
[2] https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanhatesthis/tiktok-users-are-finally-posting-about-hong-kong-but-only https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanhatesthis/tiktok-us...
- xvector 5y agoI think it's much more likely that such videos don't rise to the top because it's not what TikTok's audience cares to engage with. I honestly don't know anyone that actually wants to see political content on TikTok (though, if you seek it out, you will find it.) It's simply not what the platform is for.
- pope_meat 5y agoThat's a very naive perspective, in my opinion. I wouldn't put it past tech giants in democratic nations not to tweak their algorithms to push their own political agenda, much less tech giants in non democratic nations. It's too powerful a tool not to abuse, I know it, and you know it too.