The deadline for the popular social media app, TikTok, has passed, and yet, this app has continued to work. Let me give you a rundown as to what has been happening these past couple of weeks.
We all know the part about President Donald Trump wanting to shut down TikTok because he believed that Bytedance, a 75 billion dollar Beijing company, was collecting personal data of U.S. citizens using TikTok to spy. To try and solve this situation, President Trump gave Bytedance until Sep. 15 to sell Tiktok to an American company. Otherwise, it would get banned in the U.S. Microsoft was considering buying TikTok, but not what many people know is that Microsoft & Walmart was going to partner up to buy Tiktok. Sep. 14, right before the scheduled ban date, Bytedance rejected Microsoft’s request to buy TikTok. Bytedance did not want to give up the source codes. (Source codes are algorithms that make Tiktok, Tik Tok. They are the unique features of TikTok, like recommending videos that reflect on the interest of the viewer.) Luckily, another idea (compromise) is presented in time.
In this idea, Oracle, an American technology software company, Walmart, and ByteDance would begin a partnership and rename Tik Tok to Tik Tok Global. Bytedance will own 80%, Oracle will own 12.5%, and Walmart 7.5%. When people hear these percentages, they wonder why the President would ever agree to this because Bytedance owns, but this is not technically true. “About 40% of ByteDance is owned by US venture capital firms.”The U.S is not in complete control, but they have most of it.”
On Sep. 19, Bytedance picked Oracle and Walmart to “own” TikTok. President Trump also agreed, but in addition to this deal 25,000 jobs were created at the TIkTok Global Headquarters and $5 billion will be paid for an education fund that is being created. Everyone has agreed upon this deal.
One thing that we don’t know for sure is what is happening on Nov. 12. There are many speculations, but the most alarming one is that on Nov. 12, TikTok will officially be banned. Until this time is upon us, we will not know for sure. For right now, TikTok has been “saved.”