TikTok signs deal to give U.S. operations to Oracle-led investor group
Read More »Tag: ByteDance
Silicon Valley Venture Capital Collaboration with Israel
Venture Capital Collaboration with Israel
There are significant datapoints indicating that Gaza itself will become a Network State site. This includes documents from the Israeli Prime Minister’s office stating that the site will be used for a free trade zone and basis of new cities, as well as an energy and manufacturing hub. Trump has spoken extensively on this theme; in 2025, Trump posted an AI-generated video depicting Gaza as a Trump-themed luxury resort region, describing his idea at the White House during a visit with Netanyahu:
“The U.S will take over the Gaza Strip. We’ll do a job with it. We will own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous bombs and other weapons. We will level it out, create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area.”
Related documents:
Read More »NewsBreak Under the Microscope: Ownership, Al, and Data Privacy
The Wikipedia entry for NewsBreak is poorly written and lacks comprehensive information about the app. It claims that the Pentagon included NewsBreak on a list of companies allegedly working with the Chinese military—a claim IDG Capital, the company’s Chinese backer, refuted in a statement to Bloomberg. This assertion is based on a Reuters article.
The information provided below was collected by ChatGPT and summarized by Gemini AI. I chose not to use my preferred DeepSeek to avoid any potential accusations of bias.
Read More »Interview with Deepseek Founder: We’re Done Following. It’s Time to Lead
Interview with Deepseek Founder: We’re Done Following. It’s Time to Lead
An Yong: After your price cuts, ByteDance was the first to follow, suggesting they felt threatened. How do you view the new competitive landscape between startups and giants?
Liang Wenfeng: To be honest, we don’t really care about it. Lowering prices was just something we did along the way. Providing cloud services isn’t our main goal—achieving AGI is. So far, we haven’t seen any groundbreaking solutions. Giants have users, but their cash cows also shackle them, making them ripe for disruption.
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China vs. the US: shipbuilding, subsidies, and the Jones Act
Hypocrisy thrives where double standards prevail.
Earlier, I stupidly tweeted out an article about the Jones Act and shipbuilding and Colin Grabow, from the Cato Institute, liked it (he was quoted in the article). I looked him up and decided to listen to this video on the shipbuilding competition between China and the US, where he and a lawyer for United Steelworkers were on the panel. China is eating their lunch, and it’s the ruling elites’ own fault, yet they scapegoat China for it. The double standards over China’s “unfair economic practices” AKA the subsidizing of their shipbuilding industry irritates me (liars irritate me even more). States give subsidies, grants, and tax breaks to corporations, all the time. Fincantieri Marinette Marine is just one example, but Wisconsin had done the same for Foxconn. Foxconn received tax breaks and $3B in subsidies, which was “the largest ever subsidy provided by a state to a foreign company”, despite not living up to their promises.
Colin Grabow wants to end the Jones Act. I’ve made at least three video clips regarding the Jones Act, two with Sal Mercogliano from What’s Going On With Shipping and one from the government-funded CSIS (I’ve posted them, below). Spoiler alert: Sal says that the problem isn’t the Jones Act. Meanwhile, both CSIS and the Cato Institute (part of the Atlas Network) blame the Jones Act. Deregulation is a wet dream of big corporations (which fund both the Cato Institute and CSIS).
Read More »Trump Sold-Out His Base to Shovel $95 Billion to Ukraine and Israel
America last. America last. That’s all this is. America last, every single day. – Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene
The man who is most responsible for the $95 billion giveaway to Ukraine and Israel, is the same guy who pretends to oppose America’s “wasteful” foreign wars. Donald Trump. It was Trump who consulted with Speaker Mike Johnson about the contents of the Ukraine aid package, just as it was Trump who concocted the idea of issuing loans instead of dispersing the standard welfare handout. It was also Trump who said:
Trump Sold-Out His Base to Shovel $95 Billion to Ukraine and Israel
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Measure seeking sale or closure of TikTok passes with House foreign aid bill
April 20 (UPI) — A potential U.S. ban of the popular social media video app TikTok inched closer to reality Saturday after the House passed the legislation tucked within a long-sought foreign aid package.
Measure seeking sale or closure of TikTok passes with House foreign aid bill
Inside Mnuchin’s far-fetched plan to rebuild TikTok from scratch + Controversial former Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick could buy TikTok with help from Sam Altman
Inside Mnuchin’s far-fetched plan to rebuild TikTok from scratch
Mnuchin said he has discussed his pitch with an assortment of billionaires and big businesses, including the tech giant Oracle and the former head of the Activision Blizzard video game empire Bobby Kotick, the two people said.
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Dan Wang*, a visiting scholar at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center who studies Chinese tech and policy, said Mnuchin’s proposal would probably hit a dead end in China, which has shown no interest in consenting to a forced sale and could use its “highly discretionary” political system to block the deal.
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Controversial former Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick could buy TikTok with help from Sam Altman
Bobby Kotick spent 33 years as CEO of Activision, during which time he faced plenty of controversy. His departure from the company in December following Microsoft’s acquisition was met with celebrations from gamers and developers. There were tales of his interference with the development of Activision games over the years and his role in killing off Blizzard titles in China.
Kotick was also accused of leaving a voicemail threatening to kill an assistant in 2006 and was the subject of a flight attendant’s sexual harassment lawsuit in 2007. He faced allegations of incidents involving rape and harassment stretching from the mid-2010s through 2021, and Kotick and Activision had to pay a $35 million settlement last year after failing to maintain adequate controls to report and address misconduct within the company. Activision Blizzard also paid $54 million in 2021 to settle a gender discrimination lawsuit in California.
The alleged $15 million golden parachute Kotick received upon leaving Activision did little to endear him to the public, too.
Lawmaker Who Led TikTok Ban Bill Joins Private Surveillance Firm
Lawmaker Who Led TikTok Ban Bill Joins Private Surveillance Firm
Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher, who led the charge on a bill that could effectively ban TikTok within the country — on the basis that China can “surveil its users” — plans to take up a post with the American surveillance company and defense contractor Palantir, Forbes reported.
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Gallagher, who currently chairs the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, was the lead sponsor on the bill that would force TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell the popular social media platform within six months or face a potential ban from app stores and web-hosting services.
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After the vote, Palantir executive Jacob Helberg, who also serves on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, called on his social media followers to fund opponents to lawmakers who voted no on the bill to ban TikTok. Gallagher worked with Helberg in recent months as part of an effort to build bipartisan, bicoastal support of the bill. Helberg took a job at Palantir as a senior policy advisor to CEO Alex Karp back in August.
Related:
The United States–China Economic and Security Review Commission (informally, the U.S.–China Commission, USCC) is an independent agency of the United States government. It was established on October 30, 2000, through the Floyd D. Spence National Defense Authorization Act.
What State Action Doctrine? Biden Administration Renews Push For Deal With TikTok, Where US Government Would Oversee Content Moderation On TikTok
For all the (mostly misleading) talk of the US government having too much say in content moderation decisions, this move would literally put US government officials effectively in control of content moderation decisions for TikTok. Apparently the thinking is “welp, it’s better than the Chinese government.” But… that doesn’t mean it’s good. Or constitutional.
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Honestly, what this reads as is the moral panic over China and TikTok so eating the brains of US officials that rather than saying “hey, we should have privacy laws that block this,” they thought instead “hey, that would be cool if we could just do all the things we accuse China of doing, but where we pull the strings.”
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So, look, if we’re going to talk about US government influence over content moderation choices, why aren’t we talking much more about this?
Related:
TikTok and U.S. rekindle negotiations, boosting app’s hopes for survival
CFIUS monitoring agencies, including the departments of Justice, Treasury and Defense, would have the right to access TikTok facilities at any time and overrule its policies or contracting decisions. CFIUS would also set the rules for all new company hires, including that they must be U.S. citizens, must consent to additional background checks and could be denied the job at any time.
A Draft Of TikTok’s Plan To Avoid A Ban Gives The U.S. Government Unprecedented Oversight Power
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 
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