Tag Archives: social media

Bloomberg News reports: Steven Mnuchin, the former US Treasury Secretary, said he’s still interested in buying TikTok’s US operation from its Chinese owner, and believes the social media app’s critical video recommendation technology could be replicated. “I’ve actually spoken to a lot of tech companies on working about rebuilding this,” Mnuchin said Tuesday in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “I …

The Wall Street Journal reports: TikTok said it filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday challenging the constitutionality of a new law that requires a sale or ban of the popular social-media app, setting up a court showdown over national security and free speech in the age of global information wars. The suit, filed directly with a federal appeals court in Washington, …

The Independent reports: On Saturday, Reclaim Party leader Laurence Fox – who failed to submit the right paperwork to run for mayor and then failed to get elected in the London-wide assembly vote – penned a tweet in which he fumed that a number of elected individuals are all Muslim (even when some of them aren’t). Fox appears to have …

CNN Business reports: Truth Social’s average number of daily active US users on iOS and Android dropped by 19% year over year in April to about 113,000, according to data shared exclusively with CNN from Similarweb, a data intelligence company. The Similarweb data, which captures the first 29 days of April, showed that the average number of users dipped 4% …

Miami’s ABC affiliate reports: Two individuals have been taken into custody following an incident at a Southwest Miami-Dade day care, where they allegedly caused a panic by brandishing rifles in the vicinity of the day care center. Miguel Ruiz and Estrella Pereira are accused of removing two rifles from the trunk of a Corvette in the Devon Aire Kiddy College’s …

NBC News reports: TikTok CEO Shou Chew said Wednesday that the company would go to court to try to remain online in the United States. In a video posted on the app, Chew denounced a potential ban signed into law by President Joe Biden. The law has a built-in delay of nine months, giving TikTok’s Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, a …

The Verge reports: A bill that would force China-based company ByteDance to sell TikTok — or else face a US ban of the platform — is all but certain to become law after the Senate passed a foreign aid package including the measure. It now heads to President Joe Biden, who already committed to signing the TikTok legislation. Once signed …

The Insider reports: The House advanced legislation on Saturday that could lead to a TikTok ban in the United States. The bill forces TikTok’s Chinese owner, ByteDance, to secure American ownership in about a year or face a domestic ban. Earlier versions of the legislation gave ByteDance just six months to find a new owner. To fast-track the bipartisan legislation, …

The Verge reports: Post News, a Twitter alternative that emerged in the wake of Elon Musk’s takeover, is shutting down. Noam Bardin, the platform’s founder and former CEO of Waze, writes that Post News “is not growing fast enough to become a real business or a significant platform.” The Andreessen Horowitz-backed platform launched in a closed beta in November 2022, …

NBC News reports: NBC News found that at least 150 paid “Premium” subscriber X accounts and thousands of unpaid accounts have posted or amplified pro-Nazi content on X in recent months, often in apparent violation of X’s rules. The paid accounts posting the content all consistently posted antisemitic or pro-Nazi material. Examples included praise of Nazi soldiers, sharing of Nazi …

TechCrunch reports: Elon Musk is planning to charge new X users a “small fee” to enable posting on the social network and to curb the bot problem. While replying to another user, Musk later added that new accounts would be able to post after three months of creation without paying a fee. As is the case with a lot of …

Ars Technica reports: X will soon stop allowing users to hide their blue checkmarks, and some users are not happy. Previously, a blue tick on Twitter was a mark of a notable account, providing some assurance to followers of the account’s authenticity. But then Elon Musk decided to start charging for the blue tick instead, and mayhem ensued as a …

“As you move forward here, we’re looking at the entire ecosystem. What does it take to make sure that we protect people in the United States and around the globe from these tyrants of big tech who want to silence them? So we’re looking at the whole ecosystem. “Whether that’s through acquiring technology, whether that’s through building technology, those are …

Reuters reports: Elon Musk is challenging a decision by a Supreme Court justice in Brazil who ordered his social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, to block certain accounts, and he called on Sunday for the judge’s resignation. Musk said X was lifting all the restrictions decided by Justice Alexandre de Moraes on certain undisclosed accounts in Brazil and …

The Associated Press reports: Elon Musk’s X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, has named a new head of safety nine months after the last executive to hold the position departed from the social media company. X said that company veteran Kylie McRoberts will oversee the global safety team. The platform also announced that Yale Cohen, who previously worked for …

Agence France-Presse reports: A digital tool considered vital in tracking viral falsehoods, CrowdTangle will be decommissioned by Facebook owner Meta in a major election year, a move researchers fear will disrupt efforts to detect an expected firehose of political misinformation. The tech giant says CrowdTangle will be unavailable after August 14, less than three months before the US election. The …

The Texas Tribune reports: Texas’ top campaign finance watchdog gave initial approval last week to a proposal that would require social media users to disclose if they are being paid to share or create political advertisements. The Texas Ethics Commission’s action comes just months after The Texas Tribune reported that a secretive and politically-connected company, called Influenceable LLC, paid internet …

NBC News reports: Georgia could join other states in requiring children younger than 16 to have their parents’ explicit permission to create social media accounts. Lawmakers on Friday gave final approval to Senate Bill 351, which also would ban social media use on school devices and internet services, require porn sites to verify users are 18 or over and mandate …

CNBC reports: TikTok has launched a $2.1 million advertising campaign with a clear message for senators in tough reelection fights this year: Block the House bill that could effectively ban the app in the United States. “Think about the 5 million small business owners that rely on TikTok to provide for their families,” one purported TikTok user says in the …

The Associated Press reports: As Donald Trump’s social media company begins trading publicly Tuesday, would-be investors might ask themselves if the stock is too pricey and potentially too volatile. Trump Media debuts with a stock price near $50 and a market value of about $6.8 billion. Many of Digital World’s investors were small-time investors either trying to support Trump or …