Donald tramp I would say that TikTok saga over, what will be used in the USA under that name will belong to American companies and will have very little to do with China. Those who have been following this saga for years are somewhat more skeptical.
For those who don't know what it's all about, here's a quick introduction. ByteDance Company, Chinese origin, but based in Singapore, is the owner of the TikTok platform, which has become mega popular in a short time. It is also the only, conditionally speaking, social network that was not created in the USA. US authorities assessed six years ago that it could be a tool for espionage or surveillance of US citizens and demanded that TikTok be sold to US companies or banned.
Donald Trump announced at the beginning of September that an agreement had been reached to keep TikTok available in SAD, but under new rules. Instead of a complete ban, as some congressmen demanded, the platform gets an American face. And that through a mixture of ownership and surveillance that changes its DNA. The deal has not been fully announced, but these are the three key points.
The first is ownership. The majority package of TikTok USA passes into the hands of American investors, while the Chinese ByteDance retains a symbolic share, less than 20 percent. This removes the main political obstacle, the accusation that it is a "Chinese application in American phones".
The second point is related to the algorithm and the data. The new entity, made up of American partners, gets control over the codes, moderation and servers. User data from the US will be stored in American cloud services, without inflow from China (or Singapore). This formally resolves the issue of "national security” which was a key argument for the ban.Users will still be able to see all the content as before, but in the US they will have to reinstall the app.
The third point is management. TikTok USA will have a seven-member board - six Americans and one representative of ByteDance. Therefore, the Chinese voice remains, but a minority one, without decisive power. The Americans are satisfied with that, and the Chinese can say that they did not surrender.
The deal values TikTok USA at about $14 billion and calls for the restructuring to be completed within 120 days. The Trump administration presents it as "a victory for American technology and freedom of speech", but critics see something else - an arrangement that leaves ByteDance in the game and opens up space for American investorsma close to the president's environment. The most important player in that story is Oracle, on whose servers TikTok has worked so far, but the White House is already besieged by other IT companies and investors intent on being part of this deal.
For the average user, the change is almost invisible: TikTok remains on the phone, the algorithm continues to serve content, and debates about the "Chinese threat" move from the network to the political arena. For advertisers and creators, however, this means the platform with 170 million users in the US isn't going away. As well as the businesses that have sprung up thanks to this network, they depend on it and are worth billions of dollars.
The agreement is a compromise, neither a complete ban nor complete freedom. But in political terms, Trump managed to portray the decision as his victory. He "saved" TikTok, and at the same time put it under American control. The Chinese are happy because they kept their foot in the door. They have not opened the issue of reciprocity yet.
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