Text taken from the Telegram channel of zapiskiamerikanista
Commentary by Russian military journalist Boris Rozhin is in italics:
[ColonelCassad] The deal on TikTok: what you need to know
The main conditions of the alleged transaction are still known only from unofficial sources. Neither the Americans nor the Chinese (governments and companies) have yet officially published any actual agreements. General details and management structure.
According to unconfirmed data, the current owner of TikTok, ByteDance, will reduce its stake to less than 20%.
According to these changes, the TikTok algorithms will be controlled by a joint venture, which will include the American companies Oracle (responsible for security) and Silverlake.
In other words, the existing algorithm will be adapted to American data. According to Trump himself, in addition to Larry Ellison (Oracle), Michael Dell (Dell Technologies), the current head of FoxCorp and NewsCorp, Lachlan Murdoch (son and heir of media magnate Rupert Murdoch) is also involved in the deal.
Earlier, Trump's press secretary Caroline Levitt reported that the board of directors of TikTok will have seven seats, six of which will belong to American companies. One is ByteDance.
At the same time, the Chinese company will not be able to participate in the work of the company's security committee.
As Bloomberg journalists emphasized, the US government will not control the fate of the new company.
A new TikTok app for US users may be coming.
Implementation of agreements.
Trump is expected to sign an executive order approving the deal this week. In addition, it was previously reported about the intention of representatives of the USA and China to sign a deal.
It is emphasized that TikTok will continue to be monitored during and after the transaction, is the American legislation followed and all that.
120 days can be allocated for the implementation of the transaction (perhaps it will be highlighted in the executive order). Checks from American lawmakers should also be expected.
Why could China agree? If the deal will be implemented and will take into account most of the above conditions, then Trump will be able to write it down as a foreign policy victory. At the same time, China's readiness to enter into a deal on TikTok is inaccurately viewed as a "surrender of positions".
This is a rather forced compromise or, if you like, a concession that solves two tasks:
- saves a successful Chinese brand from unnecessary problems;
- this can hypothetically reduce the level of tension in the political and economic relations of the two countries.
It is not about the friendship between the USA and China. This is not in the program. It is about agreeing the rules of long-term economic competition in order to minimize the prospects of sharp escalation (resumption of active trade war, etc.).
But the story of economic pressure on China from the US is unlikely to end on TikTok. Since his first term, Trump has wanted to coordinate commercial dispute resolution mechanisms aimed at protecting the interests of American companies in China (in the First Phase of the trade deal in 2020, they were partially prescribed, but not implemented due to the pandemic).
Free market and free competition are like that.
PS. In Russia, TikTok has practically not been updated since 2022. The service is not formally prohibited, but it is not being developed. All this is part of the process of sovereignization of parts of the Internet that has been going on for a long time, when the states take the segments of the network available to them under direct or indirect control, and everything that does not want to be under control is banned or squeezed out.
Processes in different countries go at different speeds, but the final destination is obvious - all the main services will either be taken under control or prohibited. Like in China. It will also be the case in the USA, the Russian Federation, and the EU. And in any other country that has the resources and political will to establish such control.
PS. In Ukraine, TikTok is called "an instrument of Russian aggression", since children in Ukraine actively watch TikTok, including a large amount of content in Russian.