From your Vice Captain: Did we forget about Benjamin Franklin’s quote?

Sad week in the waters!

As a party we are facing some odd times considering our platform, platforms each individual member has and the outweighing effects of a government attacking social media this way. I do want to make clear, this is a personal statement from me and not the entire USPP.

TikTok is much like a vessel of immediate interest in the way its algorithm works. To me, it’s nothing mysterious and I feel I fully understand how it gets you what you’re looking for. There are a number of parameters it uses to determine the next video served in the vessel. Many companies could do the same thing but generally add too much marketing sauce and it quickly becomes a failure.

YouTube Shorts would be a prime example of how _close_ an algorithm may come to the ‘Tok sauce, but there’s one thing these competitors are missing- The discipline to simply let their users be.

While you’re surfing it [TikTok] will surely offer recommendations based on your viewing History, but it will also stop doing this once you begin venturing away from what you “normally” view.

Name me any social media company doing this today, though I do encourage all social media entities (even the small ones) to always try to get users. We NEED diversity.

This leads us to the conclusion we have all arrived at – and I say this with great confidence – TikTok is simply still happening and useful to the public because it doesn’t really try to “censor” much of anything of what you’re consuming. Anything the public finds useful like this is going to keep it thriving.

I find “disinformation” on there or outright lies, but I don’t leave it up to the government to take care of it – I simply scroll by or research … just to make sure, right?

This leads _me_ to the famous quote from Benjamin Franklin, “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

We didn’t stand by torrents being banned and we shouldn’t stand by this either. It needn’t matter if it’s TikTok- this will continue to happen to many other social media entities.

Vote Pirate.

Sincerely,

Ty Clifford
Vice Chair (vc@uspirates.org)
United States Pirate Party