sybercecuritya day ago
It's getting to the point where the news should be who isn't in on the deal.
This is a straight up giveaway to friends.
Even dictators in other countries don't make it so obvious because they're worried their populations would revolt, which says a lot about the American voter today.
None of Tiktok's executives were present, and China has not confirmed the sale. So, I don't think clown's EO means anything. He's living in his own la la land :-)
Tiktok's CEO is a singaporean! Maybe you are mixing it with that.
Tiktoks' parent company ByteDance is headquartered in China. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ByteDance
This would significantly impact its valuation to outside investors.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/us/politics/trump-uae-chips-witkoff-world-liberty-takeaways.html
"Earlier this year, World Liberty, the crypto firm run by the Trumps and Witkoffs, announced an agreement with an investment firm backed by the ruling family of the U.A.E. The Emirati firm would conduct a $2 billion transaction using World Liberty’s digital coins, a deal that would provide a windfall to the Trump and Witkoff families."
Here's an article if you're interested: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/15/us/politics/trump-uae-chips-witkoff-world-liberty.html
What does the UAE gain by funneling $2B to Trump, who is notoriously a) transactional and b) one of the most powerful people on the planet?
Trump is not transactional.
BUT, there is precedent for this move. They gifted an even more expensive plane to Erdogan. From what i understand they have been trying to sell the plane for a while. It seems even they have trouble affording it's upkeep. Turns out there isn't a huge market for luxury private jumbo jets. From their perspective it's a white elephant. Trump is aware of that.
I heard another explanation that this is a way of putting lateral pressure on boeing. Trump is frustrated with the progress of the new air force one. His current one is aging. It makes sense as it's a typical tactic of his.
I'm not coming to defend it, just to explain some of the rationale behind the decision.
(edit to reply to several comments. First of all air force one is well maintained but it's old already. Parts and repairs become more difficult and the amount of miles left on the airframe can't be too high. Replacement is necessary. As to building a new plane out of spares being faster... Just ask boeing how that's going for them. They even had the fuselages ready and waiting for quite some time. Boeing executives know they will face some actual consequences for murdering the POTUS, which is probably why it's taking so long. It's difficult to build a plane properly when you've gotten rid of everyone who knows how and you've sold half of your factories, some to even more bad faith actors then yourself.)
"We gave a huge gift to an authoritarian leader" is indeed precedent; not a great one, though.
I’ve been around aviation for a good portion of my life, and oddly enough, I’ve never encountered an “ordinary plane giveaway.”
Their two 737 max planes crashes, killed 346 people. I think they are immune to any pressure at this point.
well... yeah. you'd have to strip it back to bare metal components and start again, wouldn't you? trust in every bit of electronics on the plane would be zero. be faster to build a new 747 out of spare parts.
illegal.
That's the word you're looking for. The Constitution is absolutely clear on this: POTUS is not allowed to accept foreign gifts without authorization of Congress. To this day, Trump has neither sought nor received Congressional authorization.
No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person
holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent
of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any
kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.[5]
It's heartwarming to see the ruling classes coming together for their mutual benefit like this.
Fill in the blank with whatever you find personally disagreeable: TikTok, alcohol, sports gambling, hallucinogens, video games, cigars, sugary foods, etc.
/s
Is it really a mystery that there's concern about corporate media consolidation and collusion with governments to self-serve their interests over individuals?
I mean, this is beyond naive if you dismiss what's happening and will continue.
Scrolling HN I find hateful stances about hyperspecificties, overconfident self righteousness, and new peaks of misanthropism
So they value the most attention owing social media at a mere $14b? As reference: Meta has a total market cap of around $1.8 T.
> still looks small if simplifying and counting just by global population
Yes, I agree, if you ignore everything except one single number, I can see how it can be confusing.
What about Canadians?
Forget Meta's market cap, does anyone think Zuckerberg wouldn't have paid 20 billion for Tiktok USA ?
Just so corrupt and to even call it a sweetheart deal is outrageous.
I thought it should just be banned in the US. The idea we are basically strong arming a whole nation and stealing a company at a bullshit valuation is completely insane.
The data won't leave the US, the UAE are paying a protection tax.
https://www.ynetnews.com/article/5038379
Between them and a16z, this is Israel taking control of a channel they view as threatening as it gives Palestinians a voice.
Run it into the ground!
Do I understand that the strategy here is soft power so that teenagers get approved content via the algorithm in the hope that they don't notice? That is a pretty big gamble.
So they are dumping part of that risk on the gulf monarchies like with Twitter. I bet China is already working on a TikTok replacement.
This is likely also why Meta announced that they are overhauling Instagram to make Reels and recommendations the default experience - https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/instagram-overhaul-app-number-users-102358878.html. Just as with Threads, they saw an opening and are doubling down hard.