WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.879 Hello and welcome to another Deep Dive. Today 00:00:01.879 --> 00:00:06.839 is Monday, February 2, 2026. And if you've been 00:00:06.839 --> 00:00:09.660 tracking the headlines, or honestly just trying 00:00:09.660 --> 00:00:11.300 to scroll through your phone over the last couple 00:00:11.300 --> 00:00:14.160 of weeks, you know things are different. Different 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:17.320 is one word for it. The digital ground has fundamentally 00:00:17.320 --> 00:00:20.719 shifted under our feet. It really has. We're 00:00:20.719 --> 00:00:22.660 looking at what feels like a completely new internet 00:00:22.660 --> 00:00:25.059 architecture, and it all happened, what, just 00:00:25.059 --> 00:00:28.809 10 days ago. It's the end of an era. And the 00:00:28.809 --> 00:00:32.350 start of. Well, that's what we're here to figure 00:00:32.350 --> 00:00:34.210 out, isn't it? But you're right. We are sitting 00:00:34.210 --> 00:00:36.350 here just a couple of weeks past January 22, 00:00:36.649 --> 00:00:39.710 2026. And that's a date that is going to be in 00:00:39.710 --> 00:00:42.189 the history books for media studies, for political 00:00:42.189 --> 00:00:45.149 science, probably for computer engineering for 00:00:45.149 --> 00:00:47.869 decades to come. That was the day the ink finally 00:00:47.869 --> 00:00:51.119 dried. After years of speculation, the US operations 00:00:51.119 --> 00:00:53.840 of TikTok were officially sold to a US consortium. 00:00:53.859 --> 00:00:56.359 The saga is finally over. I mean, the ban threats, 00:00:56.679 --> 00:00:59.479 the court cases, the executive orders, it's been 00:00:59.479 --> 00:01:01.920 going on for what feels like forever. And it 00:01:01.920 --> 00:01:04.439 all just culminated in this one absolutely massive 00:01:04.439 --> 00:01:07.719 transaction. It is massive. And I think before 00:01:07.719 --> 00:01:09.439 we even get into the weeds of what's happening 00:01:09.439 --> 00:01:11.659 now, we have to just take a second to appreciate 00:01:11.659 --> 00:01:14.400 the sheer scale of what was just sold. Right. 00:01:14.480 --> 00:01:16.379 We're not just talking about some app where teenagers 00:01:16.379 --> 00:01:18.980 do dances. I mean, we are talking about a platform 00:01:18.980 --> 00:01:22.920 that way back in 2021 surpassed Google. Surpassed 00:01:22.920 --> 00:01:25.219 Google. As the most popular domain on the entire 00:01:25.219 --> 00:01:27.180 Internet. I remember when that stat dropped, 00:01:27.299 --> 00:01:29.319 it felt like a glitch in the matrix. You know, 00:01:29.359 --> 00:01:31.500 Google is the Internet for most people. It's 00:01:31.500 --> 00:01:34.840 the front door. Yeah. For a video feed to overtake 00:01:34.840 --> 00:01:37.730 search traffic. That was the signal that the 00:01:37.730 --> 00:01:40.230 entire hierarchy of information had just been 00:01:40.230 --> 00:01:42.909 turned on its head. Precisely. And the growth 00:01:42.909 --> 00:01:45.629 was just astronomical. It reached... A billion 00:01:45.629 --> 00:01:48.209 users faster than Facebook, faster than Instagram, 00:01:48.390 --> 00:01:51.489 faster than YouTube. A billion. By 2020, it had 00:01:51.489 --> 00:01:55.209 over 2 billion downloads and was operating in 00:01:55.209 --> 00:01:58.109 50 languages. This wasn't just a product. It 00:01:58.109 --> 00:02:01.390 became a global cultural engine. It effectively 00:02:01.390 --> 00:02:04.049 replaced the whole idea of the social graph from 00:02:04.049 --> 00:02:07.609 the 2010s with something entirely new. And that 00:02:07.609 --> 00:02:11.199 is exactly. the mission for this deep dive. We 00:02:11.199 --> 00:02:14.620 have a huge stack of sources here from technical 00:02:14.620 --> 00:02:17.599 breakdowns of the recommendation engine to supply 00:02:17.599 --> 00:02:20.680 chain reports on pharmaceutical shortages. Everything. 00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:23.199 We're not just going to rehash the political 00:02:23.199 --> 00:02:25.439 theater of the last month, though we obviously 00:02:25.439 --> 00:02:27.199 have to touch on it. We're going to try to unpack 00:02:27.199 --> 00:02:30.240 the black box of the app itself. We have to answer 00:02:30.240 --> 00:02:33.490 the fundamental question. What did this American 00:02:33.490 --> 00:02:36.610 consortium actually buy? Because, sure, the ownership 00:02:36.610 --> 00:02:39.289 changed, but the machinery is what matters. The 00:02:39.289 --> 00:02:42.360 engine. the engine how does that algorithm actually 00:02:42.360 --> 00:02:45.639 work how did it rewrite the rules for the music 00:02:45.639 --> 00:02:49.159 industry for fashion and i mean even how we buy 00:02:49.159 --> 00:02:52.340 medicine and crucially what does this new ownership 00:02:52.340 --> 00:02:55.599 mean for the future of that machinery we're already 00:02:55.599 --> 00:02:57.900 seeing the fallout we've got reports of censorship 00:02:57.900 --> 00:03:01.360 we've got the rise of competitor apps like upscrolled 00:03:01.360 --> 00:03:03.139 and this fracturing of the internet that people 00:03:03.139 --> 00:03:05.419 have been warning about for years it's happening 00:03:05.419 --> 00:03:07.740 it really is it's a lot to get through it is 00:03:07.740 --> 00:03:10.800 but we have to start with that ender, the secret 00:03:10.800 --> 00:03:13.180 sauce. Okay, let's get into it. Segment one, 00:03:13.360 --> 00:03:17.560 the algorithm. For years, the narrative around 00:03:17.560 --> 00:03:21.939 TikTok has been that it's just magic. You know, 00:03:21.979 --> 00:03:24.439 you open it and it just reads your mind. Right, 00:03:24.500 --> 00:03:27.060 the telepathic feed. But looking at the technical 00:03:27.060 --> 00:03:28.960 papers and some of the leaked audit documents 00:03:28.960 --> 00:03:32.219 we have, it's not magic. It's just extremely 00:03:32.219 --> 00:03:34.680 efficient collaborative filtering. It's math. 00:03:35.180 --> 00:03:38.759 Very specific, very aggressive math. And to understand 00:03:38.759 --> 00:03:41.080 why it worked so well, you really have to contrast 00:03:41.080 --> 00:03:42.819 it with the incumbent at the time, which was 00:03:42.819 --> 00:03:45.860 Facebook. Facebook and Instagram, to a lesser 00:03:45.860 --> 00:03:47.979 extent, were built on what we called the social 00:03:47.979 --> 00:03:50.340 graph. The social graph being, I see content 00:03:50.340 --> 00:03:52.819 because I know you, we're friends, or I follow 00:03:52.819 --> 00:03:55.379 you, so your posts appear in my feed. The personal 00:03:55.379 --> 00:03:57.960 connection is the filter. Exactly. The constraint 00:03:57.960 --> 00:04:00.379 on your feed was your social circle. TikTok just 00:04:00.379 --> 00:04:02.419 flipped that completely on its head. They built 00:04:02.419 --> 00:04:05.919 an interest graph. The For You page. FYP. And 00:04:05.919 --> 00:04:08.280 that page didn't care who you knew. It didn't 00:04:08.280 --> 00:04:10.840 care if you had zero friends or zero followers 00:04:10.840 --> 00:04:13.060 on the platform. Which is so different from anything 00:04:13.060 --> 00:04:16.860 else. It only cared about one thing. The content's 00:04:16.860 --> 00:04:19.199 performance against your specific behavioral 00:04:19.199 --> 00:04:21.839 vector. And this is where the cold start problem 00:04:21.839 --> 00:04:25.120 usually kills new apps, right? Yeah. But TikTok 00:04:25.120 --> 00:04:28.589 somehow solved it. They did. You could join post 00:04:28.589 --> 00:04:31.189 one video. And if the signals were right, you 00:04:31.189 --> 00:04:34.269 could hit a million views in 24 hours. The barrier 00:04:34.269 --> 00:04:37.209 to entry was effectively zero. So let's talk 00:04:37.209 --> 00:04:39.110 about those signals, because I think most people 00:04:39.110 --> 00:04:42.269 still overestimate the value of a like. A like 00:04:42.269 --> 00:04:45.339 is a very weak signal. It's almost. You might 00:04:45.339 --> 00:04:47.139 like a video just to be nice or because your 00:04:47.139 --> 00:04:48.600 friend sent it to you, but it doesn't mean you 00:04:48.600 --> 00:04:51.500 really loved it. The algorithm, according to 00:04:51.500 --> 00:04:53.360 the leaked engineering documents we're looking 00:04:53.360 --> 00:04:56.939 at, prioritized one thing above all else. Right. 00:04:57.040 --> 00:04:59.399 Retention. So weighted completion rate. That's 00:04:59.399 --> 00:05:01.420 the industry term for it. Yeah. Yeah. Did you 00:05:01.420 --> 00:05:03.519 watch the video from the very start to the very 00:05:03.519 --> 00:05:06.720 finish? That is a massive positive signal to 00:05:06.720 --> 00:05:08.339 the algorithm. And if you watched it more than 00:05:08.339 --> 00:05:11.060 once. Oh, that's exponential. A rewatch is gold. 00:05:11.629 --> 00:05:14.389 But it goes so much deeper than that. It tracks 00:05:14.389 --> 00:05:16.970 the velocity of your scroll. The speed of your 00:05:16.970 --> 00:05:20.149 thumb. Exactly. If you linger on a video about, 00:05:20.189 --> 00:05:22.350 say, sourdough baking for just three seconds 00:05:22.350 --> 00:05:24.649 before swiping versus swiping instantly on a 00:05:24.649 --> 00:05:27.069 dance video, the system records that hesitation. 00:05:27.129 --> 00:05:30.129 It learns. So it's analyzing your boredom threshold 00:05:30.129 --> 00:05:33.910 in real time. It's building a profile based on 00:05:33.910 --> 00:05:37.029 these tiny micro interactions that you, the user. 00:05:37.420 --> 00:05:39.240 aren't even aware you're performing. And this 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:40.920 is where that Wall Street Journal investigation 00:05:40.920 --> 00:05:44.040 from 2021 was so pivotal. You remember that? 00:05:44.100 --> 00:05:45.899 Vaguely, yeah. They made a bunch of fake accounts. 00:05:46.040 --> 00:05:48.139 They created all these bot accounts with very 00:05:48.139 --> 00:05:50.259 specific interests. One was programmed to be 00:05:50.259 --> 00:05:52.459 into depression content. One was into politics 00:05:52.459 --> 00:05:55.480 and so on. And they just tracked how long it 00:05:55.480 --> 00:05:57.480 took the algorithm to figure them out. And it 00:05:57.480 --> 00:06:00.100 was terrifyingly fast, wasn't it? I think. The 00:06:00.100 --> 00:06:01.699 number that stuck with me was something like 00:06:01.699 --> 00:06:05.079 40 minutes. 40 minutes for the algorithm to completely 00:06:05.079 --> 00:06:07.579 zero in on a user's psychological vulnerabilities 00:06:07.579 --> 00:06:10.459 and build a feed around them. Wow. Because it 00:06:10.459 --> 00:06:13.160 excels at understanding emotion. It's not just 00:06:13.160 --> 00:06:15.800 tagging videos with cats or cars. It's tagging 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:20.040 them with soothing, chaotic, depressive, aspirational. 00:06:20.120 --> 00:06:23.579 So it creates a feed that feels telepathic. Because 00:06:23.579 --> 00:06:26.220 it's literally mapping your emotional state in 00:06:26.220 --> 00:06:28.240 real time. And it's serving you dopamine hits 00:06:28.240 --> 00:06:29.939 that are perfectly tailored to your psychological 00:06:29.939 --> 00:06:31.899 profile at that exact moment you're scrolling. 00:06:32.019 --> 00:06:34.579 Which brings us to the algorithmic meritocracy 00:06:34.579 --> 00:06:37.560 argument. The idea that the best content just 00:06:37.560 --> 00:06:40.740 rises to the top and the feed is this perfect 00:06:40.740 --> 00:06:44.079 unbiased mirror of what you want to see. The 00:06:44.079 --> 00:06:47.790 great myth. But. We know that's not entirely 00:06:47.790 --> 00:06:49.790 true, is it? We have to talk about heating. The 00:06:49.790 --> 00:06:51.829 heating button. This is the thing that completely 00:06:51.829 --> 00:06:54.310 undermines that whole meritocracy myth. This 00:06:54.310 --> 00:06:58.410 story broke in Forbes back in January 2023. And 00:06:58.410 --> 00:06:59.769 I remember reading it and just thinking, OK, 00:06:59.850 --> 00:07:02.529 so the game is rigged. It was. The report revealed 00:07:02.529 --> 00:07:05.009 that employees at both TikTok and its parent 00:07:05.009 --> 00:07:08.899 company, ByteDance, had a manual tool. I'm literally 00:07:08.899 --> 00:07:11.740 a boost button that could just push certain videos 00:07:11.740 --> 00:07:14.160 into the viral stratosphere. So it wasn't just 00:07:14.160 --> 00:07:15.980 the algorithm picking the winners. It was humans, 00:07:16.120 --> 00:07:19.699 employees sitting at desks. The report estimated 00:07:19.699 --> 00:07:22.220 that at any given time, one to two percent of 00:07:22.220 --> 00:07:25.319 total daily video views were heated. And one 00:07:25.319 --> 00:07:27.740 or two percent sounds small. It sounds tiny. 00:07:27.860 --> 00:07:30.680 But on a platform with billions of views a day, 00:07:30.879 --> 00:07:34.079 that's tens of millions of artificially generated 00:07:34.079 --> 00:07:38.810 impressions every single day. And the criteria 00:07:38.810 --> 00:07:41.290 for heating a video, it wasn't just, oh, this 00:07:41.290 --> 00:07:44.170 is a good video. It was strategic. Highly strategic. 00:07:44.269 --> 00:07:46.709 I mean, originally the stated purpose was innocent 00:07:46.709 --> 00:07:48.970 enough. It was about diversity. Right. Because 00:07:48.970 --> 00:07:51.449 if the algorithm is too efficient, it just rabbit 00:07:51.449 --> 00:07:53.829 holes you into one type of content. Exactly. 00:07:53.829 --> 00:07:56.769 And you get bored. So they would heat videos 00:07:56.769 --> 00:07:59.889 from different genres to force them into your 00:07:59.889 --> 00:08:03.050 feed to sort of broadening your horizons and, 00:08:03.129 --> 00:08:05.269 you know, keep you on the app longer. But they 00:08:05.269 --> 00:08:07.490 also use it for business. Of course they did. 00:08:07.569 --> 00:08:10.250 They used it to court influencers and major brands. 00:08:10.370 --> 00:08:12.990 If you're trying to get, say, Taylor Swift to 00:08:12.990 --> 00:08:15.550 join the platform or the NBA or the FIFA World 00:08:15.550 --> 00:08:17.550 Cup. You can't leave their view counts up to 00:08:17.550 --> 00:08:20.029 chance. You can't. You heat their first few videos. 00:08:20.149 --> 00:08:21.769 They see these millions of views. They get that 00:08:21.769 --> 00:08:24.149 same dopamine hit we were talking about and suddenly 00:08:24.149 --> 00:08:25.949 they're hooked. It's basically a bait and switch. 00:08:26.189 --> 00:08:30.350 It's just corporate vanity metrics. But the Forbes 00:08:30.350 --> 00:08:32.429 report went darker than that, didn't it? It wasn't 00:08:32.429 --> 00:08:35.460 just corporate strategy. No. There were instances 00:08:35.460 --> 00:08:39.419 of employees using it for personal reasons. That's 00:08:39.419 --> 00:08:42.059 the real risk of any kind of manual intervention. 00:08:42.519 --> 00:08:45.259 So what, boosting their own videos? You had reports 00:08:45.259 --> 00:08:48.080 of employees heeding their own personal accounts 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:50.799 or their spouse's account or their friend's accounts. 00:08:51.039 --> 00:08:53.299 It just shattered the illusion that if you just 00:08:53.299 --> 00:08:57.500 made good content, you could be famous. In reality, 00:08:57.620 --> 00:09:00.039 there was always this editorial layer, a human 00:09:00.039 --> 00:09:02.379 layer, deciding what the culture should see. 00:09:02.840 --> 00:09:04.480 Which brings us to a really important distinction, 00:09:04.720 --> 00:09:07.039 the one between what we saw here in the West 00:09:07.039 --> 00:09:10.139 and what exists in China. Because for a long 00:09:10.139 --> 00:09:11.919 time, there was this misconception that TikTok 00:09:11.919 --> 00:09:14.720 was the same app everywhere. Right. But we need 00:09:14.720 --> 00:09:16.960 to talk about Douyin. Douyin is the original. 00:09:17.100 --> 00:09:19.600 TikTok is effectively the export version of the 00:09:19.600 --> 00:09:21.899 app. And while they share the same underlying 00:09:21.899 --> 00:09:24.740 code base, the same DNA, they really evolved 00:09:24.740 --> 00:09:27.539 into two completely different species. Douyin 00:09:27.539 --> 00:09:30.460 is often described as a super app in China. It's 00:09:30.460 --> 00:09:33.059 not just for entertainment. No, not at all. It's 00:09:33.059 --> 00:09:35.460 integrated into the economy in a way that TikTok 00:09:35.460 --> 00:09:38.120 is only just now starting to attempt in the West. 00:09:38.700 --> 00:09:41.779 Years ago, Davin had these advanced features. 00:09:42.100 --> 00:09:45.580 Like what? Like you could search a video by a 00:09:45.580 --> 00:09:48.179 person's face to find other content they appeared 00:09:48.179 --> 00:09:51.120 in. You could book a hotel directly through a 00:09:51.120 --> 00:09:53.700 travel video. If you saw a restaurant review 00:09:53.700 --> 00:09:56.059 you liked, you could tap a button and reserve 00:09:56.059 --> 00:09:58.879 a table. Wow. It was an e -commerce engine first 00:09:58.879 --> 00:10:01.690 and an entertainment app second. But the biggest 00:10:01.690 --> 00:10:03.210 difference, the one that always came up in the 00:10:03.210 --> 00:10:05.710 political debates, was the regulation, the so 00:10:05.710 --> 00:10:08.289 -called teenage mode. This is what critics of 00:10:08.289 --> 00:10:11.450 ByteDance always, always pointed to. In China, 00:10:11.509 --> 00:10:13.549 the government enforced these incredibly strict 00:10:13.549 --> 00:10:16.169 controls on Douyin for minors. If you were under 00:10:16.169 --> 00:10:18.490 14 years old, you were automatically placed in 00:10:18.490 --> 00:10:20.409 teenage mode. And that wasn't just a suggestion 00:10:20.409 --> 00:10:22.409 you could click past. It was a hard lock. A hard 00:10:22.409 --> 00:10:25.190 lock. You were limited to 40 minutes a day. The 00:10:25.190 --> 00:10:27.490 app was completely inaccessible between 10 p 00:10:27.490 --> 00:10:31.129 .m. and 6 a .m. And most importantly, the content 00:10:31.129 --> 00:10:34.149 itself was filtered. So no viral dances or pranks. 00:10:34.600 --> 00:10:37.019 No. You were seeing science experiments, virtual 00:10:37.019 --> 00:10:40.019 museum tours, history lessons, patriotic content. 00:10:40.320 --> 00:10:42.679 It was all educational. It was essentially a 00:10:42.679 --> 00:10:45.700 state -run digital classroom. It was, whereas 00:10:45.700 --> 00:10:50.059 the export version, or TikTok, had none of those 00:10:50.059 --> 00:10:52.419 guardrails, at least not initially. It was the 00:10:52.419 --> 00:10:55.440 Wild West. And critics called it an opium for 00:10:55.440 --> 00:10:58.500 the masses strategy. The argument was keep the 00:10:58.500 --> 00:11:00.580 domestic population educated and disciplined 00:11:00.580 --> 00:11:03.320 and export the digital fentanyl to the West. 00:11:04.460 --> 00:11:06.620 Digital fentanyl, as you call it, didn't just 00:11:06.620 --> 00:11:09.159 keep people scrolling. It fundamentally reshaped 00:11:09.159 --> 00:11:11.700 entire industries. Absolutely. Which brings us 00:11:11.700 --> 00:11:14.299 perfectly to the next section, the cultural ripple 00:11:14.299 --> 00:11:16.960 effect. Let's start with music, because I think 00:11:16.960 --> 00:11:18.860 that's where the impact was most immediate and 00:11:18.860 --> 00:11:21.720 most obvious. TikTok became the de facto A &R 00:11:21.720 --> 00:11:24.139 department for the entire global music industry. 00:11:24.320 --> 00:11:25.980 I mean, if you look at the Billboard Hot 100 00:11:25.980 --> 00:11:30.600 from, say, 2020 to 2025, there is a direct undeniable 00:11:30.600 --> 00:11:33.179 correlation between TikTok virality and chart 00:11:33.179 --> 00:11:36.580 success. It became the kingmaker. Lil Nas X is 00:11:36.580 --> 00:11:38.679 the classic case study, right? Old Town Road 00:11:38.679 --> 00:11:40.929 didn't break because of radio play. It broke 00:11:40.929 --> 00:11:43.809 because of memes. But I think the more interesting 00:11:43.809 --> 00:11:46.669 phenomenon really was the sleeper hit. The resurrection 00:11:46.669 --> 00:11:49.389 of the back catalog. This was both a nightmare 00:11:49.389 --> 00:11:52.230 and an absolute goldmine for the record labels. 00:11:52.429 --> 00:11:55.779 Right. Suddenly, Fleetwood Mac's Dreams is charting 00:11:55.779 --> 00:11:58.039 because of a guy on a skateboard drinking ocean 00:11:58.039 --> 00:12:01.919 spray. Or Kate Bush's Running Up That Hill hitting 00:12:01.919 --> 00:12:04.899 number one decades after it was released, all 00:12:04.899 --> 00:12:07.779 because it was in Stranger Things and then exploded 00:12:07.779 --> 00:12:11.200 in a TikTok trend. It completely broke the traditional 00:12:11.200 --> 00:12:14.019 music release cycle. Labels stopped focusing 00:12:14.019 --> 00:12:17.379 only on what was new and started like data mining 00:12:17.379 --> 00:12:20.080 their own archives for 15 second soundbites that 00:12:20.080 --> 00:12:22.740 might go viral. But that power dynamic created 00:12:22.740 --> 00:12:25.360 massive friction. We have to talk about the Universal 00:12:25.360 --> 00:12:28.200 Music Group standoff in early 2024. That was 00:12:28.200 --> 00:12:30.960 a huge moment. UMG, the biggest music company 00:12:30.960 --> 00:12:33.039 in the world, basically looked at the numbers 00:12:33.039 --> 00:12:35.220 and said, wait a minute, you're building a multi 00:12:35.220 --> 00:12:37.320 -billion dollar business on our back and you're 00:12:37.320 --> 00:12:39.320 paying us pennies for it. So they pulled the 00:12:39.320 --> 00:12:41.799 plug. They removed their entire catalog from 00:12:41.799 --> 00:12:44.559 the platform. Taylor Swift, Drake, The Weeknd 00:12:44.559 --> 00:12:46.620 just gone overnight. The app felt like a ghost 00:12:46.620 --> 00:12:48.200 town for a few months. I remember it was just 00:12:48.200 --> 00:12:51.100 like... royalty -free stock music and really 00:12:51.100 --> 00:12:53.220 bad acapella covers. It was a game of chicken. 00:12:53.679 --> 00:12:57.019 And UMG was also citing concerns about AI, which 00:12:57.019 --> 00:12:59.639 was a huge deal at the time. They were worried 00:12:59.639 --> 00:13:02.059 that TikTok was becoming a breeding ground for 00:13:02.059 --> 00:13:05.019 AI -generated tracks that were diluting the royalty 00:13:05.019 --> 00:13:08.340 pool for real human artists. But they came back 00:13:08.340 --> 00:13:11.230 eventually. They did. Taylor Swift's music returned 00:13:11.230 --> 00:13:14.929 in April 2024. But the whole episode proved that 00:13:14.929 --> 00:13:17.090 even the biggest artists in the world were now 00:13:17.090 --> 00:13:19.570 dependent on this one platform for discovery 00:13:19.570 --> 00:13:22.190 and distribution. But the ripple effect went 00:13:22.190 --> 00:13:24.929 way, way beyond entertainment. We saw it in global 00:13:24.929 --> 00:13:27.269 supply chains. Yeah. The Feta Pasta incident 00:13:27.269 --> 00:13:29.909 is kind of funny, but it's also a serious case 00:13:29.909 --> 00:13:32.480 study in logistics failure. It sounds ridiculous, 00:13:32.639 --> 00:13:35.299 but it was absolutely real. A single viral recipe 00:13:35.299 --> 00:13:38.240 video caused a global run on block -fedded cheese. 00:13:38.500 --> 00:13:41.320 A global run. Grocery stores in Finland and the 00:13:41.320 --> 00:13:43.279 U .S. and the U .K., they just ran out of stock 00:13:43.279 --> 00:13:46.039 for weeks. Dairy supply chains are not built 00:13:46.039 --> 00:13:48.299 for that kind of viral spike. You can't just, 00:13:48.379 --> 00:13:50.919 you know, make more cheese overnight. It takes 00:13:50.919 --> 00:13:53.240 months. That is the Amazon effect on steroids. 00:13:53.860 --> 00:13:56.519 But, I mean, while running out of cheese is annoying, 00:13:56.720 --> 00:13:58.500 running out of medicine is life -threatening. 00:13:58.659 --> 00:14:02.080 Yes. The Ozempic shortage is... probably the 00:14:02.080 --> 00:14:05.539 single most serious real -world consequence of 00:14:05.539 --> 00:14:07.860 the entire TikTok era. This is where the ethics 00:14:07.860 --> 00:14:11.200 get really, really murky. You had a drug, semaglutide, 00:14:11.419 --> 00:14:14.960 sold as Ozempic or Wegovy, that was designed 00:14:14.960 --> 00:14:17.679 for people with type 2 diabetes. Right. And it 00:14:17.679 --> 00:14:20.139 had a known side effect of weight loss. Suddenly, 00:14:20.200 --> 00:14:23.980 you have a hashtag, hashtag Ozempic journal with 00:14:23.980 --> 00:14:28.120 over 360 million views. You have influencers 00:14:28.120 --> 00:14:30.460 who were not diabetic at all documenting their 00:14:30.460 --> 00:14:32.539 dramatic weight loss. And they were getting prescriptions 00:14:32.539 --> 00:14:35.139 off -label. Exactly. The demand just skyrocketed 00:14:35.139 --> 00:14:37.269 overnight. Pharmacies could... not keep up. And 00:14:37.269 --> 00:14:39.450 the result was that actual diabetics people who 00:14:39.450 --> 00:14:41.649 needed that drug to regulate the insulin levels 00:14:41.649 --> 00:14:44.470 could not fill their prescription. We have reports 00:14:44.470 --> 00:14:46.750 from the Australian Medical Regulatory Agency 00:14:46.750 --> 00:14:49.850 explicitly linking the national shortage directly 00:14:49.850 --> 00:14:52.750 to these social media trends. It just highlights 00:14:52.750 --> 00:14:55.389 this massive failure in our information ecosystem. 00:14:56.190 --> 00:14:58.769 Medical advice was being dispensed by influencers 00:14:58.769 --> 00:15:02.149 with zero qualifications, and the algorithm didn't 00:15:02.149 --> 00:15:04.490 distinguish between a board -certified endocrinologist 00:15:04.490 --> 00:15:07.529 and a 19 -year -old beauty vlogger. No, if the 00:15:07.529 --> 00:15:09.649 vlogger had better lighting and a catchier hook, 00:15:09.870 --> 00:15:12.269 they got the views. And the market responded 00:15:12.269 --> 00:15:14.909 to the views. It forced pharmaceutical companies 00:15:14.909 --> 00:15:17.389 to completely rethink their manufacturing and 00:15:17.389 --> 00:15:19.950 supply chains, all because of an algorithmic 00:15:19.950 --> 00:15:23.000 trend. And we saw the same thing happen in publishing 00:15:23.000 --> 00:15:25.460 with BookTok. BookTok was fascinating because 00:15:25.460 --> 00:15:28.519 it was one of the few like purely positive supply 00:15:28.519 --> 00:15:31.600 chain shocks. It single handedly revived the 00:15:31.600 --> 00:15:34.200 physical book market, especially for young adults. 00:15:34.299 --> 00:15:36.519 It's true. You go into a Barnes & Noble now. 00:15:36.879 --> 00:15:39.580 And there are whole tables dedicated to as seen 00:15:39.580 --> 00:15:42.360 on BookTok. It drove millions of copies of sales 00:15:42.360 --> 00:15:45.179 for authors like Colleen Hoover. It proved that 00:15:45.179 --> 00:15:47.299 long form reading wasn't dead. It just needed 00:15:47.299 --> 00:15:49.919 a new discovery engine. And fashion, too. The 00:15:49.919 --> 00:15:52.279 midsize movement was born there. That was a really 00:15:52.279 --> 00:15:55.120 important corrective movement. For years, fashion 00:15:55.120 --> 00:15:58.860 was so binary. You were either a size zero or 00:15:58.860 --> 00:16:01.990 you were plus size. TikTok creators started showing 00:16:01.990 --> 00:16:05.190 what a size 10 or 12 or 14 actually looked like. 00:16:05.330 --> 00:16:07.750 It forced brands to acknowledge the existence 00:16:07.750 --> 00:16:10.870 of the average body. But we also saw the darker 00:16:10.870 --> 00:16:13.750 side of all that consumerism with the de -influencing 00:16:13.750 --> 00:16:17.009 trend. Oh man. I love the concept of de -influencing 00:16:17.009 --> 00:16:18.970 at first. Don't buy this. It's overhyped. It's 00:16:18.970 --> 00:16:21.600 trash. It felt like a genuine rebellion. It started 00:16:21.600 --> 00:16:23.799 that way. It was a backlash against the constant, 00:16:23.879 --> 00:16:26.919 unrelenting pressure to consume, to buy, to haul. 00:16:27.279 --> 00:16:29.799 But look at how quickly it was co -opted. Almost 00:16:29.799 --> 00:16:31.779 immediately. Within weeks, the script completely 00:16:31.779 --> 00:16:34.419 flipped. It became, don't buy this expensive 00:16:34.419 --> 00:16:37.919 $40 mascara. Buy this $10 mascara instead. And 00:16:37.919 --> 00:16:39.799 by the way, here's my personal affiliate link 00:16:39.799 --> 00:16:42.460 for the $10 mascara. So it wasn't anti -consumption 00:16:42.460 --> 00:16:45.139 at all. It was just... alternative consumption. 00:16:45.460 --> 00:16:47.799 The system just absorbs the critique. You cannot 00:16:47.799 --> 00:16:50.860 exist on that platform without feeding the commerce 00:16:50.860 --> 00:16:53.539 engine. Even the very act of saying don't buy 00:16:53.539 --> 00:16:56.000 became a new kind of shopping recommendation. 00:16:56.320 --> 00:16:59.039 That feels like a perfect, if slightly depressing, 00:16:59.460 --> 00:17:03.159 segue to the darker psychological impacts. Because 00:17:03.159 --> 00:17:04.859 if the app can trick you into buying mascara, 00:17:05.140 --> 00:17:07.140 it can trick you into much, much worse. Segment 00:17:07.140 --> 00:17:10.759 three, the dark side. We have to talk about the 00:17:10.759 --> 00:17:13.519 rabbit hole. This is the core safety flaw of 00:17:13.720 --> 00:17:17.259 any interest -based graph. If a user shows even 00:17:17.259 --> 00:17:20.160 a momentary fleeting interest in something harmful, 00:17:20.420 --> 00:17:24.490 say extreme dieting, or self -harm imagery. The 00:17:24.490 --> 00:17:27.150 algorithm doesn't see harmful. It just sees engagement. 00:17:27.349 --> 00:17:29.029 It just sees engagement. Yeah. And it serves 00:17:29.029 --> 00:17:31.269 more of it. The feedback loop tightens incredibly 00:17:31.269 --> 00:17:34.150 quickly. We have ample documentation of teenagers 00:17:34.150 --> 00:17:37.430 being just bombarded with pro -anorexia content 00:17:37.430 --> 00:17:40.069 or suicide ideation within minutes of searching 00:17:40.069 --> 00:17:42.089 for something as innocent as weight loss tips. 00:17:42.349 --> 00:17:44.289 And the users were always one step ahead of the 00:17:44.289 --> 00:17:46.349 moderators. We saw the rise of what people called 00:17:46.349 --> 00:17:48.710 algo -speak. Right. Users would write suicide 00:17:48.710 --> 00:17:52.759 as unalive or porn as They created this whole 00:17:52.759 --> 00:17:55.900 new lexicon to bypass the automated content filters. 00:17:56.079 --> 00:17:57.779 But the human brain, especially the adolescent 00:17:57.779 --> 00:18:00.980 brain, decoded it instantly. The filter didn't 00:18:00.980 --> 00:18:03.579 work on people. Not at all. And the most tragic 00:18:03.579 --> 00:18:06.460 outcomes of this were the challenges, the blackout 00:18:06.460 --> 00:18:09.299 challenge in particular. This was horrific. It 00:18:09.299 --> 00:18:12.500 encouraged users, mostly kids, to choke themselves 00:18:12.500 --> 00:18:15.160 until they passed out, supposedly to achieve 00:18:15.160 --> 00:18:17.839 some kind of high. And it resulted in the deaths 00:18:17.839 --> 00:18:20.990 of multiple children globally. There were major 00:18:20.990 --> 00:18:24.109 lawsuits filed in Italy, in the U .S. In Venezuela, 00:18:24.250 --> 00:18:26.430 the Supreme Court actually ordered a crackdown 00:18:26.430 --> 00:18:29.869 and fined TikTok tens of millions of dollars 00:18:29.869 --> 00:18:32.930 in late 2024 after two children died there. It 00:18:32.930 --> 00:18:34.730 just raises this fundamental question of liability. 00:18:35.289 --> 00:18:38.490 Is the platform a publisher or is it just a mirror 00:18:38.490 --> 00:18:41.930 reflecting society? Well, the TikTok ticks phenomenon 00:18:41.930 --> 00:18:44.369 suggests it's much more than just a mirror. It 00:18:44.369 --> 00:18:46.970 can be a biological influence. This was a genuine 00:18:46.970 --> 00:18:49.220 medical mystery for a moment, wasn't it? Doctors 00:18:49.220 --> 00:18:51.559 in the US, the UK, Australia, they all started 00:18:51.559 --> 00:18:54.660 seeing this surge in teenage girls presenting 00:18:54.660 --> 00:18:57.480 with rapid onset tics. And they were very similar 00:18:57.480 --> 00:18:59.299 to Tourette's syndrome. They were shouting the 00:18:59.299 --> 00:19:01.940 same specific phrases, making the same specific 00:19:01.940 --> 00:19:03.819 physical movements. And they traced it all back 00:19:03.819 --> 00:19:06.630 to a few specific creators on the platform. They 00:19:06.630 --> 00:19:08.990 did. These patients were all watching popular 00:19:08.990 --> 00:19:11.910 creators who genuinely had Tourette's syndrome. 00:19:12.329 --> 00:19:15.109 And the doctors determined it was a form of mass 00:19:15.109 --> 00:19:17.509 psychogenic illness. So what does that mean? 00:19:17.710 --> 00:19:20.369 It means the teenagers' mirror neurons were firing 00:19:20.369 --> 00:19:22.650 so intensely from watching these videos over 00:19:22.650 --> 00:19:25.309 and over that they physically adopted the symptoms 00:19:25.309 --> 00:19:27.589 they were watching. It shows that the connection 00:19:27.589 --> 00:19:30.069 between the screen and the brain is far more 00:19:30.069 --> 00:19:32.250 porous, far more direct than we ever thought. 00:19:32.410 --> 00:19:35.299 Wow. And then on top of all that, there's the 00:19:35.299 --> 00:19:37.619 whole issue of child safety regarding predators. 00:19:37.839 --> 00:19:40.460 The fines really tell the story there. The UK 00:19:40.460 --> 00:19:43.339 fined them $12 .7 million for misusing children's 00:19:43.339 --> 00:19:47.420 data. The EU hit them with a massive $345 million 00:19:47.420 --> 00:19:51.079 fine. The U .S. had that early $5 .7 million 00:19:51.079 --> 00:19:53.460 fine. But the investigation into the lives feature 00:19:53.460 --> 00:19:55.720 was arguably the most disturbing part of it all. 00:19:55.819 --> 00:19:58.710 The refugee camp scams. Yeah. A BBC investigation 00:19:58.710 --> 00:20:01.210 found that families in Syrian refugee camps were 00:20:01.210 --> 00:20:03.750 going on TikTok live and begging for digital 00:20:03.750 --> 00:20:05.849 gifts from viewers. And the viewers thought they 00:20:05.849 --> 00:20:07.690 were donating directly to help these desperate 00:20:07.690 --> 00:20:10.670 families. Right. But when the money was actually 00:20:10.670 --> 00:20:13.569 processed, TikTok was taking up to 70 percent, 00:20:13.630 --> 00:20:17.359 seven zero of the proceeds as a commission. So 00:20:17.359 --> 00:20:20.039 they were profiting off digital begging in a 00:20:20.039 --> 00:20:22.579 literal war zone. It was an absolute low point 00:20:22.579 --> 00:20:25.460 for the company. And then you had the sexual 00:20:25.460 --> 00:20:28.019 exploitation scandals in Kenya that were exposed 00:20:28.019 --> 00:20:30.900 in 2025, where the live streaming feature was 00:20:30.900 --> 00:20:33.059 being used essentially as cam girl sites for 00:20:33.059 --> 00:20:35.000 minors. It just highlighted that at the scale 00:20:35.000 --> 00:20:37.599 of a billion users. Moderation is basically a 00:20:37.599 --> 00:20:39.859 myth. You cannot police that much live video 00:20:39.859 --> 00:20:42.599 effectively. It's impossible. And all of these 00:20:42.599 --> 00:20:44.779 safety failures, they provided the ammunition 00:20:44.779 --> 00:20:47.119 for the politicians. But the gun was already 00:20:47.119 --> 00:20:50.480 loaded by geopolitics. Exactly. Segment four, 00:20:50.619 --> 00:20:52.950 the road to the sale. You simply cannot separate 00:20:52.950 --> 00:20:55.450 the story of this app from the broader anxieties 00:20:55.450 --> 00:20:57.609 of the U .S.-China relationship. It all comes 00:20:57.609 --> 00:21:00.190 down to the fact that TikTok was owned by ByteDance, 00:21:00.309 --> 00:21:03.210 a company headquartered in Beijing. In the current 00:21:03.210 --> 00:21:05.950 geopolitical climate, that was just a non -starter 00:21:05.950 --> 00:21:08.549 for Washington. It centers on two key things, 00:21:08.789 --> 00:21:11.130 the golden share and the national intelligence 00:21:11.130 --> 00:21:13.509 law of 2017. Let's break those down. OK, the 00:21:13.509 --> 00:21:16.170 golden share. The golden share is a specific 00:21:16.170 --> 00:21:19.500 Chinese corporate mechanism. The Chinese government, 00:21:19.740 --> 00:21:22.059 usually through state -backed funds, takes a 00:21:22.059 --> 00:21:25.240 1 % stake in the key domestic subsidiaries of 00:21:25.240 --> 00:21:27.920 big tech companies like ByteDance. And 1 % sounds 00:21:27.920 --> 00:21:30.859 tiny, but it's not about the money. It's not 00:21:30.859 --> 00:21:32.400 about the money at all. It comes with special 00:21:32.400 --> 00:21:34.720 rights, usually a board seat and, crucially, 00:21:34.839 --> 00:21:38.380 veto power over major content decisions. So the 00:21:38.380 --> 00:21:40.339 argument that ByteDance is just a private company 00:21:40.339 --> 00:21:42.680 doesn't hold water in the same way it would for 00:21:42.680 --> 00:21:45.039 a U .S. company. Exactly. And then you layer 00:21:45.039 --> 00:21:47.140 on top of that the 2017 national intelligence 00:21:47.140 --> 00:21:50.740 law. This law explicitly states that any Chinese 00:21:50.740 --> 00:21:53.140 organization or citizen shall, and I'm quoting 00:21:53.140 --> 00:21:59.000 here, And the interpretation of that in the West 00:21:59.000 --> 00:22:01.680 was pretty clear. If Beijing asks for the data, 00:22:01.839 --> 00:22:04.420 ByteDance cannot legally say no. That was the 00:22:04.420 --> 00:22:07.680 core fear. And to be fair, ByteDance tried to 00:22:07.680 --> 00:22:10.539 fight this perception for years. They spent billions 00:22:10.539 --> 00:22:13.119 on lobbying. They swore up and down that the 00:22:13.119 --> 00:22:15.769 data was firewalled. But then came the leaks. 00:22:15.930 --> 00:22:18.250 The BuzzFeed news tapes, that quote, everything 00:22:18.250 --> 00:22:20.990 is seen in China. That audio leaked in 2022. 00:22:21.630 --> 00:22:24.670 It was from internal meetings where U .S.-based 00:22:24.670 --> 00:22:27.170 employees were admitting that the master admin 00:22:27.170 --> 00:22:30.130 accessed the keys to the kingdom still resided 00:22:30.130 --> 00:22:32.890 in Beijing. It completely undercut their entire 00:22:32.890 --> 00:22:35.190 public narrative. And then came the spying scandal 00:22:35.190 --> 00:22:38.609 in December 2022. This wasn't theoretical anymore. 00:22:38.730 --> 00:22:41.700 No, this was active surveillance. ByteDance's 00:22:41.700 --> 00:22:43.900 own internal audit team was trying to find the 00:22:43.900 --> 00:22:47.019 source of leaks to the press. To do that, they 00:22:47.019 --> 00:22:49.319 accessed the personal TikTok data of journalists 00:22:49.319 --> 00:22:52.359 from Forbes and the Financial Times. Oh. They 00:22:52.359 --> 00:22:54.339 tracked their IP addresses and their location 00:22:54.339 --> 00:22:56.500 data to see if they were ever in the same physical 00:22:56.500 --> 00:22:59.339 proximity as ByteDance employees who they suspected 00:22:59.339 --> 00:23:02.180 were the leakers. They used the app to hunt down 00:23:02.180 --> 00:23:04.859 whistleblowers. It was the smoking gun. It proved 00:23:04.859 --> 00:23:07.220 that the tool could be used for espionage. Because 00:23:07.220 --> 00:23:09.819 it was being used for espionage, albeit for corporate 00:23:09.819 --> 00:23:12.490 security. rather than state intelligence. But 00:23:12.490 --> 00:23:14.869 for lawmakers, the damage was done. So TikTok 00:23:14.869 --> 00:23:17.990 had to pivot hard. They announced Project Texas. 00:23:18.029 --> 00:23:20.829 This was their Hail Mary pass. The plan was to 00:23:20.829 --> 00:23:24.769 create a new subsidiary, TikTokUSDS, and store 00:23:24.769 --> 00:23:28.170 all U .S. user data on servers that were physically 00:23:28.170 --> 00:23:32.210 in the U .S. and owned by Oracle. The American 00:23:32.210 --> 00:23:34.710 tech giant. And Oracle was supposed to audit 00:23:34.710 --> 00:23:36.390 the code, right? That was part of the deal. That 00:23:36.390 --> 00:23:38.849 was the big pitch. Oracle would review every 00:23:38.849 --> 00:23:40.849 single line of code that went into the app to 00:23:40.849 --> 00:23:43.230 ensure there were no back doors to China. They 00:23:43.230 --> 00:23:45.029 did a similar thing in Europe called Project 00:23:45.029 --> 00:23:47.250 Clover. So why didn't it work? Why didn't Congress 00:23:47.250 --> 00:23:50.470 buy it? Because of the very nature of modern 00:23:50.470 --> 00:23:53.750 software. The TikTok algorithm isn't a static 00:23:53.750 --> 00:23:55.930 document you can read once and approve. It's 00:23:55.930 --> 00:23:58.890 updated constantly. It's machine learning. It 00:23:58.890 --> 00:24:01.670 evolves by the second. Critics, including a lot 00:24:01.670 --> 00:24:03.569 of technical experts, pointed out that you cannot 00:24:03.569 --> 00:24:05.869 effectively audit an algorithm that changes every 00:24:05.869 --> 00:24:08.329 second unless Oracle controlled the source of 00:24:08.329 --> 00:24:10.210 the code, not just reviewed it. The whole thing 00:24:10.210 --> 00:24:11.890 was kind of meaningless. So the trust was just 00:24:11.890 --> 00:24:15.890 gone. And that brings us to segment five, the 00:24:15.890 --> 00:24:19.710 showdown. The years 2024 to 2026. What a roller 00:24:19.710 --> 00:24:23.069 coaster. It really was. It started with the legislative 00:24:23.069 --> 00:24:26.579 hammer. In March of 2024, the U .S. House passed 00:24:26.579 --> 00:24:30.400 H .R. 7521. President Biden signed it into law 00:24:30.400 --> 00:24:32.660 in April. The clock officially started ticking. 00:24:32.880 --> 00:24:36.839 The deadline was January 19th, 2025. Divest or 00:24:36.839 --> 00:24:39.240 be banned. And people forget how close we came 00:24:39.240 --> 00:24:42.759 to the cliff. On January 18, 2025, the day before 00:24:42.759 --> 00:24:45.460 that deadline, TikTok actually went dark in the 00:24:45.460 --> 00:24:48.880 U .S. for about 12 hours. The near -death experience. 00:24:49.079 --> 00:24:51.039 I remember it so clearly. My feed just had that 00:24:51.039 --> 00:24:53.140 spinning circle. No connection. It was total 00:24:53.140 --> 00:24:55.619 chaos. For millions of creators and small businesses, 00:24:55.900 --> 00:24:58.660 their entire livelihood just vanished overnight. 00:24:59.180 --> 00:25:01.640 But then the political winds shifted. Donald 00:25:01.640 --> 00:25:04.519 Trump had just won the 2024 election. And despite 00:25:04.519 --> 00:25:06.559 having tried to ban it himself during his first 00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:09.700 term, he did a complete 180. He flipped. He realized 00:25:09.700 --> 00:25:11.680 the immense political capital of the platform. 00:25:11.859 --> 00:25:13.359 He didn't want to be the guy who killed the most 00:25:13.359 --> 00:25:16.180 popular app in America on day one of his inauguration. 00:25:16.200 --> 00:25:18.470 So he delayed it. He issued an executive order 00:25:18.470 --> 00:25:20.930 delaying the enforcement of the ban. He essentially 00:25:20.930 --> 00:25:23.390 bought them time to find a buyer. But he couldn't 00:25:23.390 --> 00:25:25.950 kill the law entirely. The legal pressure remained. 00:25:26.549 --> 00:25:28.849 ByteDance had to sell. And the rumors were just 00:25:28.849 --> 00:25:31.329 wild for a while. For a moment, it really looked 00:25:31.329 --> 00:25:33.410 like Elon Musk might buy it and try to merge 00:25:33.410 --> 00:25:36.609 it with X. I remember that. Then Steve Mnuchin 00:25:36.609 --> 00:25:38.849 was putting together a group. But the deal that 00:25:38.849 --> 00:25:42.630 finally closed on January 22, 2026 was much more 00:25:42.630 --> 00:25:45.009 establishment. Let's look at the new owners. 00:25:45.450 --> 00:25:47.650 Who actually holds the keys to the kingdom now? 00:25:47.849 --> 00:25:50.309 It's officially called the USDS joint venture. 00:25:50.690 --> 00:25:54.490 Now, ByteDance actually got to keep 19 .9%. They 00:25:54.490 --> 00:25:56.029 aren't fully out of the picture, which was a 00:25:56.029 --> 00:25:58.029 big concession. But the controlling stake? The 00:25:58.029 --> 00:26:01.630 controlling 80 .1 % is a mix of Oracle, the private 00:26:01.630 --> 00:26:04.630 equity firm Silverlake, an AI company called 00:26:04.630 --> 00:26:07.990 MGX, and a consortium led by Michael Dell. So 00:26:07.990 --> 00:26:10.630 it's big tech and private equity. It is as corporate 00:26:10.630 --> 00:26:13.630 America as you can possibly get. Adam Presser 00:26:13.630 --> 00:26:16.390 is the new CEO. Sho Chu is still on the board 00:26:16.390 --> 00:26:18.950 as a director. But the power has clearly shifted. 00:26:19.170 --> 00:26:21.970 The servers are fully under U .S. control. But 00:26:21.970 --> 00:26:23.809 there is one line in that deal announcement that 00:26:23.809 --> 00:26:26.210 caught everyone's attention. The source notes 00:26:26.210 --> 00:26:28.049 we have mentioned that the algorithm will be 00:26:28.049 --> 00:26:30.589 adjusted over time to favor American topics. 00:26:30.849 --> 00:26:33.549 That is the phrase that pays. Favor American 00:26:33.549 --> 00:26:36.349 topics. What does that mean technically? Does 00:26:36.349 --> 00:26:39.230 it mean boosting NFL clips over soccer clips? 00:26:39.470 --> 00:26:42.130 Or does it mean suppressing foreign news? Or 00:26:42.130 --> 00:26:44.250 does it mean something more ideological? And 00:26:44.250 --> 00:26:46.410 we're already finding out. Which brings us to 00:26:46.410 --> 00:26:49.049 right now, segment six, the new controversy. 00:26:49.970 --> 00:26:52.750 Because we all thought the sale would save the 00:26:52.750 --> 00:26:54.849 app, but it seems like we've just traded one 00:26:54.849 --> 00:26:57.450 set of problems for another. We basically traded 00:26:57.450 --> 00:27:00.730 China anxiety for corporate censorship anxiety. 00:27:01.210 --> 00:27:04.009 The ink on the deal is barely dry, and we are 00:27:04.009 --> 00:27:06.890 already seeing widespread reports of videos disappearing. 00:27:07.109 --> 00:27:09.779 Specifically political content. Yes. There are 00:27:09.779 --> 00:27:12.059 very serious allegations. And Gavin Newsom, the 00:27:12.059 --> 00:27:13.980 governor of California, is already launching 00:27:13.980 --> 00:27:16.039 an investigation into this, that the new algorithm 00:27:16.039 --> 00:27:18.660 is suppressing anti -Trump content, criticism 00:27:18.660 --> 00:27:22.680 of ICE, and very curiously, any mentions of Jeffrey 00:27:22.680 --> 00:27:24.940 Epstein. So the fear for years was that the Chinese 00:27:24.940 --> 00:27:27.839 government would use the app to manipulate American 00:27:27.839 --> 00:27:30.720 public opinion. Now, the accusation is that the 00:27:30.720 --> 00:27:33.380 new American owners are using the app to manipulate 00:27:33.380 --> 00:27:35.859 American public opinion. It really raises the 00:27:35.859 --> 00:27:39.269 question. Is a platform this powerful ever neutral? 00:27:39.589 --> 00:27:43.190 And the answer seems to be a resounding no. Whoever 00:27:43.190 --> 00:27:46.230 owns the server owns the reality. And the users 00:27:46.230 --> 00:27:48.329 are reacting. We are seeing a mass migration. 00:27:48.670 --> 00:27:50.569 It's the SplinterNet happening in real time. 00:27:50.710 --> 00:27:52.730 Just look at the App Store charts this week. 00:27:52.809 --> 00:27:55.089 An app called Upscrolled is sitting at number 00:27:55.089 --> 00:27:58.609 two. It's a direct TikTok clone and its whole 00:27:58.609 --> 00:28:01.309 marketing pitch is unfiltered feeds. But the 00:28:01.309 --> 00:28:04.150 irony, and I love this detail. is the rise of 00:28:04.150 --> 00:28:07.289 RedNote. This is the ultimate plot twist. RedNote 00:28:07.289 --> 00:28:10.029 is the international name for Xiaohongshu, which 00:28:10.029 --> 00:28:11.930 is another Chinese app. It's sort of like a mix 00:28:11.930 --> 00:28:14.150 of Instagram and Reddit. So let me get this straight. 00:28:14.329 --> 00:28:17.289 Users are fleeing the newly Americanized TikTok. 00:28:17.849 --> 00:28:20.690 because of censorship fears to join an actual 00:28:20.690 --> 00:28:22.630 Chinese app. Because they perceive it as being 00:28:22.630 --> 00:28:25.309 more authentic and crucially outside the reach 00:28:25.309 --> 00:28:27.809 of U .S. political tinkering. It just shows you 00:28:27.809 --> 00:28:30.069 how completely fractured the landscape has become. 00:28:30.369 --> 00:28:32.009 We used to have something resembling a global 00:28:32.009 --> 00:28:34.849 village. Everyone everywhere saw the same memes. 00:28:35.009 --> 00:28:39.089 Now. Now we have walls, digital walls. TikTok 00:28:39.089 --> 00:28:42.769 is banned in India, Nepal, Albania, banned it 00:28:42.769 --> 00:28:45.750 in 2025. It's restricted on government devices 00:28:45.750 --> 00:28:48.880 all across the EU and the U .S. And now the U 00:28:48.880 --> 00:28:52.140 .S. version is its own distinct, curated garden. 00:28:52.299 --> 00:28:55.319 The global era of the Internet is over. We are 00:28:55.319 --> 00:28:57.440 now entering the era of the sovereign Internet, 00:28:57.559 --> 00:29:00.440 where every region has its own truth, its own 00:29:00.440 --> 00:29:03.299 trends, and its own algorithmic bias baked right 00:29:03.299 --> 00:29:05.720 in. That is a heavy realization. We started this 00:29:05.720 --> 00:29:07.740 deep drive looking at a simple dancing app. And 00:29:07.740 --> 00:29:10.200 we ended up staring at the fragmentation of global 00:29:10.200 --> 00:29:12.779 reality itself. That's the story of the 2020s, 00:29:12.779 --> 00:29:15.269 I guess. The tools we built to connect us ended 00:29:15.269 --> 00:29:17.089 up just sorting us into our own little silos. 00:29:17.950 --> 00:29:19.910 So here's the final thought for you listening. 00:29:20.150 --> 00:29:22.710 The algorithm has new masters. It is now officially 00:29:22.710 --> 00:29:25.329 tuned, in their own words, to favor American 00:29:25.329 --> 00:29:27.730 topics. But does that actually make you feel 00:29:27.730 --> 00:29:30.289 safer? Or does it just make you wonder what you 00:29:30.289 --> 00:29:32.210 aren't seeing anymore? The black box is still 00:29:32.210 --> 00:29:34.109 a black box. We just painted it red, white, and 00:29:34.109 --> 00:29:36.890 blue. And if upscrolled is the new refuge from 00:29:36.890 --> 00:29:39.430 all this, does the cycle just start all over 00:29:39.430 --> 00:29:41.849 again? History would suggest it does. On that 00:29:41.849 --> 00:29:44.920 note. We're going to log off. Stay curious. Check 00:29:44.920 --> 00:29:48.480 your sources. And maybe go read a physical book. 00:29:48.559 --> 00:29:49.099 See you next time.