<story><title>I built ByteDance&apos;s censorship machine</title><url>https://www.protocol.com/i-built-bytedance-censorship-machine-2650611161</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>svieira</author><text>&amp;gt; As a young unicorn, ByteDance does not have strong government relationships like other tech giants do, so it&amp;#x27;s walking a tightrope every second.&lt;p&gt;For those in free countries: when you build moderation tools and use them to silence political dissent &amp;quot;because you have to &amp;#x2F; to play the game&amp;quot; the game plays you.  There is no one &amp;quot;too big&amp;quot; to be crushed by those with the material source of political power [1] and everyone tells themselves that they &amp;quot;have to&amp;quot; build the tools because they don&amp;#x27;t have the &amp;quot;power&amp;quot; to push back or because &amp;quot;it really is that bad this time&amp;quot;.  But some things don&amp;#x27;t have to be built (or built in the centralized, controllable way that they are).  And when centralization is required or &amp;quot;it really is that bad this time&amp;quot;, censorship should be widely publicized and discussed both in real time and with regular retrospectives on decisions to censor that are _public_.&lt;p&gt;For those in dictatorships: All is not lost, regardless. [2][3]&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Political_power_grows_out_of_the_barrel_of_a_gun&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Political_power_grows_out_of_t...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;web.archive.org&amp;#x2F;web&amp;#x2F;20120107141633&amp;#x2F;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vaclavhavel.cz&amp;#x2F;showtrans.php?cat=clanky&amp;amp;val=72_aj_clanky.html&amp;amp;typ=HTML&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;web.archive.org&amp;#x2F;web&amp;#x2F;20120107141633&amp;#x2F;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vaclav...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[3]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;The_Power_of_the_Powerless&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;The_Power_of_the_Powerless&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>ksec</author><text>&amp;gt;&amp;gt; As a young unicorn, ByteDance does not have strong government relationships like other tech giants do, so it&amp;#x27;s walking a tightrope every second.&lt;p&gt;And just to use the same quote. This sentence is just a spin to say the least. Before TikTok, ByteDance&amp;#x27;s main product was Jinri Toutiao, which translate as Today&amp;#x27;s Headlines. It was Number one &amp;quot;news&amp;quot; Apps in China.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Toutiao&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Toutiao&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>I built ByteDance&apos;s censorship machine</title><url>https://www.protocol.com/i-built-bytedance-censorship-machine-2650611161</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>svieira</author><text>&amp;gt; As a young unicorn, ByteDance does not have strong government relationships like other tech giants do, so it&amp;#x27;s walking a tightrope every second.&lt;p&gt;For those in free countries: when you build moderation tools and use them to silence political dissent &amp;quot;because you have to &amp;#x2F; to play the game&amp;quot; the game plays you.  There is no one &amp;quot;too big&amp;quot; to be crushed by those with the material source of political power [1] and everyone tells themselves that they &amp;quot;have to&amp;quot; build the tools because they don&amp;#x27;t have the &amp;quot;power&amp;quot; to push back or because &amp;quot;it really is that bad this time&amp;quot;.  But some things don&amp;#x27;t have to be built (or built in the centralized, controllable way that they are).  And when centralization is required or &amp;quot;it really is that bad this time&amp;quot;, censorship should be widely publicized and discussed both in real time and with regular retrospectives on decisions to censor that are _public_.&lt;p&gt;For those in dictatorships: All is not lost, regardless. [2][3]&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Political_power_grows_out_of_the_barrel_of_a_gun&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Political_power_grows_out_of_t...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;web.archive.org&amp;#x2F;web&amp;#x2F;20120107141633&amp;#x2F;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vaclavhavel.cz&amp;#x2F;showtrans.php?cat=clanky&amp;amp;val=72_aj_clanky.html&amp;amp;typ=HTML&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;web.archive.org&amp;#x2F;web&amp;#x2F;20120107141633&amp;#x2F;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.vaclav...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[3]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;The_Power_of_the_Powerless&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;The_Power_of_the_Powerless&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>908B64B197</author><text>The question is what should we, western nations, do about this?&lt;p&gt;Should we keep hiring, sponsoring and giving away residency to engineers who made the decision to help building these platforms? Or collectively decide not to reward these behaviors?</text></comment>