back to article Microsoft confirms pursuit of TikTok after Satya Nadella chats to Donald Trump

Microsoft has confirmed it is considering the purchase of made-in-China social network TikTok and that its CEO Satya Nadella has spoken with US president Donald Trump to re-assure him about the security and taxation implications of the putative purchase. Microsoft has been rumoured to be courting TikTok for the last week, but …

  1. BenDwire Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Tik Tok, Tik Tok ...

    Microsoft TikTok, Boom, Crash, Tinkle. Er, oops!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Tik Tok, Tik Tok ...

      BSoTT

    2. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Trollface

      Re: Tik Tok, Tik Tok ...

      Tik, TIk, Tik, TIk, *BOOM* (like that song)

  2. Sanctimonious Prick
    WTF?

    I Just Don't Get It

    Apologies if I've missed something obvious, but I just can't see what it is...

    Umm... how can Microsoft buy TikTok if ByteDance does not want to sell? Will the almighty US just take it away from ByteDance and give it to MS?

    Pompeo claims TikTok is feeding all user data to the Chinese Communist Party. So fucking what? Which US tech companies give the US government user data? MS? Cisco? Google? Facebook? IBM? AT&T? Verizon? Amazon? Apple? (might've missed a few hundred)

    I'm not into social media type things too much (as in no FB, Insta, etc), but I'm going to download and install TikTok today, coz, I just feel like chucking a tanty!!

    1. logicalextreme

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      I imagine that if a deal isn't negotiated then things carry on as before and Trump does what he was going to do regarding the matter (j/k, he doesn't know what he's going to do and I'm fairly sure he doesn't even know what he has done either).

    2. Danny Boyd

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      ByteDance does want to sell. https://www.reuters.com/video/watch/idOVCPKADT7

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I Just Don't Get It

        "China's ByteDance has agreed to divest the U.S. operations of TikTo"

        They're prepared to sell the *US* operations. So Trump is effectively trying to make the US operation worthless, driving down that sale price.

        I wonder what his kickback is? There is rarely a thing he doesn't that doesn't include a kickback for Trump. He's pretty strapped for cash right now, he's been taking money out from his PACs in large chunks and has a loan payment coming up for his failing businesses:

        Debt ridden failing businesses:

        https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/06/donald-trump-loans-deutsche-bank/

        "Win or lose in November, one thing won’t change for Donald Trump: Over the next few years, his company must settle a series of whopping debts. Before the end of a theoretical second term, his company will have to refinance—or, in a far less likely scenario, pay off—nearly a half-billion dollars in loans linked to some of his most prized assets, including Trump Tower"

        Laundering PAC money into Trump money:

        https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2020/07/21/how-donald-trump-moved-millions-from-his-campaign-donors-to-his-private-business/

        "$2.2 million of contributions from other people has turned into $2.2 million of revenue for Trump. And that’s just counting the money flowing directly through the president’s campaign. His reelection apparatus also includes two joint fundraising committees, which work with the Republican Party to raise money for Trump....Then there’s the Republican National Committee, which has spent an additional $2.4 million at Trump properties. Add it all up, and the president, working in concert with the party he leads, has helped push $6.9 million into his businesses since taking office. "

        I wonder also what happened to Lev Parnas case, he seems to have shut up since $1 million landed in his wifes account as a 'loan from Russia to buy property'. Lev was charged with laundering foreign money into Trump and RNC PACs, so the money Trump is taking out to pay his bills is money that partly came in from Russia via Parnas.

        https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-12-16/giuliani-ally-says-1-million-moved-from-russia-was-loan-to-wife

        "Lev Parnas, an associate of Rudy Giuliani indicted on U.S. campaign finance charges, said a $1 million transfer into his wife’s bank account from Russia was the proceeds of a loan -- and not an attempt to conceal his assets."

        It's all going titsup for Trump. Perhaps he shouldn't have committed treason? Perhaps he shouldn't have sold out the USA to Putin? Just a thought, but how was it ever going to end well for him?

    3. Peter2 Silver badge

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      Umm... how can Microsoft buy TikTok if ByteDance does not want to sell?

      Chinese owned company is doing well in the USA, but China bans US companies from existing in the Chinese market or requires "technology transfers" that allows Chinese owned companies to build a knockoff product.

      The Chinese owned company has no particular intention to sell any ownership because it's doing well in the USA Market.

      US President announces that he's going to eliminate any Chinese tech company from the US Market. The Chinese company suddenly decides that actually they might be interested in selling at any price to make some money before the ban comes in since otherwise they will cease to exist with nothing to show for it.

      1. werdsmith Silver badge

        Re: I Just Don't Get It

        Chinese companies getting too big and threatening to resist American hegemony.

        First Huawei, now TikTok, Alibaba next in the crosshairs.

        1. Poncey McPonceface
          Mushroom

          Re: I Just Don't Get It

          This is the Entities List

          All entities on this list are sanctioned for national security reasons such as spying – the company allegedly spies on US citizens or allegedly engages in commercial espionage – or is said to be complicit in human rights violations such as forced labour or surveillance or (and this is the kicker) is said to be a supplier of tech to the Chinese military. I mean, China is not technically an enemy of the US, right?

          Within mainland China alone I count some *230* entities. That's not including the international operations of these Chinese entities.

          So it turns out that the leader of the so-called free world is not that interested in actual free markets.

          Just think about all the suppliers to the US military, large and small, being put on someone's entity list. Haven't most if not all big tech companies in the US some kind of ties to the US military?

          I'm really struggling to wrap my head around this Tik Tok move by Microsoft. It reeks to high heaven.

          Here are a couple of recent examples of Department of Commerce press releases: Friday, May 22, 2020 – 24 governmental and commercial organizations and Monday, July 20, 2020 – 11 Chinese companies

          The US is basically at war economically with China and it's not messing around.

          Huawei and Tik Tok are just the tip of the iceberg – they've got name recognition so they are what generate the news column inches. Contextually speaking, this is a particularly shoddy article from The Register. There is obviously so much more going on here, this deal is shady as all hell, and El Reg is commenting on it as if it were just another big tech M&A.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @Pompeo

      Although a bit off topic, I think people missed something Pompeo said that was key to the coming coup and I want to rant.

      https://www.usnews.com/news/elections/articles/2020-07-30/pompeo-reacts-to-trumps-proposal-to-delay-november-election

      ""I'm not going to enter a legal judgement on the fly this morning," Pompeo told Sen. Tim Kaine during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, after the Virginia Democrat asked about Trump's tweet. "In the end, the DOJ, others, will make that legal determination."

      IN THE END THE BILL BARR WILL DECIDE IF TRUMP CAN DELAY THE ELECTIONS, claimed Pompeo. No, that's not how laws work, Barr has zero legal basis to decide how to interpret laws.

      Pompeo's is really telling you what they have planned here, a specious claim from Bill Barr, and some Republican operatives will follow that specious claim, regardless of legality. The courts will be slow to overrule and Barr will ignore their rulings anyway.

      Pompeo didn't just let that slip, he is floating the initial premis of their plan.

      Example. You see how the Treasury is required to hand over Trump taxs returns, yet the DOJ invents some non-existent rule and the taxes are not handed over.

      Example. You see how the court rules you cannot take kids from parents at the border , and force the parents to waive their rights or never see their kids again. The court ruled it had to stop, and yet it continued anyway. They just stop documenting it, and started keeping the kids somewhere private where rights lawyers were not there to observe!

      Just two weeks ago, they found 200 such kidnapped kids under guard in a private hotel with no papers and no way of tracing where they were seized from:

      https://www.newsweek.com/hampton-inn-ice-detainees-hotels-1520532

      A tip off by the police to a human rights lawyer, led him to the hotel to find the kids they'd grabbed.

      So you see how they ignore the courts, and Barr provides cover stopping the court enforcing rulings.

      So this guy, Brad Raffensperger, will shut down the vote in Georgia, as will other Republican operatives in other Republican controlled states:

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_Secretary_of_State

      They don't have a legal basis, they don't care, they know they will never face prosecution if they can grab power. Not for their crimes, not for the quarter of million plus they're killing in wave 2 of Covid 19.

      People keep talking about laws and courts, as if coups are about laws. They're about complacency. If Brad knew he's be facing murder charges for his actions, he wouldn't have attended that meeting, he wouldn't have agreed to this course of action.

      Apathy is how democracies fail.

      That's why Portland was a disaster for Trump. He pushed, they pushed back. First blacks, then whites, then moms, then vets. He could have killed them all, not just the few deaths and few blinded people Trump initiated.

      It was a disaster for him.

      So Brad, how confident do you feel about cancelling that election now? You're on the losing side, take the smart move and do your job and pretend you never had that discussion.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      I can think about two probable scenarios:

      Microsoft wants to buy TikTok but ByteDance genuinely does not want to sell. Trump bans TikTok so if it does not belong to MICROS~1 it cannot operate on the USA

      Microsoft wants to buy TikTok but it is too expensive (they saying "we are not for sale" meaning "you're not putting enough cash over the table"). Trump bans TikTok so its value plummets after losing a big slice of its userbase, then MICROS~1 buys cheaper

    6. a_yank_lurker

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      One has to look at the relevant statutes to see exactly what Trump can do about TT. If he can label it spyware for the Chinese government with a reasonably straight face he probably has the authority to ban TT or have it seized (to be resold). Either way, the nominal owners lose money directly. Selling TT to a US company even at a bargain basement price will get them some money. This type of seizure or forced sale has been done before during WWI definitely by the Ferals and I think less frequently since then. Also, I believe the origin of RCA was to put control of radio patents in the US under control of a US owned company in the 1920's (the victim was the British Marconi company).

    7. martinusher Silver badge

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      You cannot rely on anything that comes from this administration, and especially Donald Trump, to be true, accurate or realistic.The Los Angeles Time's take on this is:-

      "The Trump administration’s choice of an app that teenagers use to share comedy skits and dance moves as its cyberdefense beachhead, despite an absence of any proof the app has been used against U.S. interests, is pure 2020, with the president swirling hard-headed concerns about national security and corporate espionage into a broader campaign of economic and diplomatic gamesmanship against an increasingly powerful rival."

      I've read elsewhere that it was retaliation from the "Chinese virus" or because TikTok users were believed behind the Tulsa rally debacle (they ordered an aggregate of a million tickets... it was going to be the rally to end all rallies, a suitable launch for Trump 2020....and a few thousand turned up). As for TikTok being forced to sell their US interests there might be some kind of obscure defense legislation that forces this but in real life this sort of thing would get bogged down in the courts. Its about a ridiculous as claiming that Mercedes-Benz USA is sending sensitive customer information to the German government (well, they probably are, but its to sell more cars -- after all, what else can you use the data for?).

    8. rcxb Silver badge

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      Umm... how can Microsoft buy TikTok if ByteDance does not want to sell?

      Everyone is willing to sell anything for the right price. The threats from Trump to ban the service have no doubt pushed that price down. Microsoft was already in talks, so it's obvious ByteDance was seriously considering selling.

      Pompeo claims TikTok is feeding all user data to the Chinese Communist Party. So fucking what? Which US tech companies give the US government user data?

      China is happy to restrict US companies from selling to their domestic market, it doesn't seem unreasonable for the US to turn this tactic back around on them.

    9. Sanctimonious Prick
      Mushroom

      Re: I Just Don't Get It

      And just to be a complete prick, and to show how ugly I am, I made a TikTok video using

      gumfreeau

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Looks like Donnie the Don

    is trying to make TikTok a M$ offer they can't refuse.

    1. Thought About IT

      Re: Looks like Donnie the Don

      Nadella probably had to promise that he'd ban Sarah Cooper, before Trump would allow him to buy TikTok.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Looks like Donnie the Don

      You just couldn't make this shit up:

      Donald Trump: "US Treasury should get cut of TikTok deal."

      If that isn't Racketeering, I don't know what is.

    3. macjules

      Re: Looks like Donnie the Don

      Think it might just be a way for Trump to try and stop all those Sarah Cooper parody videos on TikTok.

  4. xyz Silver badge

    Lol...

    MS talked to Trump... I didn't know Google Translate did Nerd to Ape or did they just use brightly coloured balls, sparkly things and grunts and stuff.

    COVID + Tic Tok = BAD (throw pos)

    US + Tic Tok = GOOD (show banana, make chewing motions and rub belly)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Lol...

      Tic Tok is one of the two distinct noises that a cuckoo-clock makes. Trump will provide the other.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Lol...

      I’m confused. Were the brightly coloured balls, sparkly things and grunts and stuff for the Nerds or for Trump?

  5. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

    Tik Update Tok

    Prediction: If this happens, expect lots of ideas for the letter "I" and letters "S", "U" and "P".

    1. El blissett

      Re: Tik Update Tok

      Tik-In Tock: Satya's Undercooked Purchase

  6. AnoniMouse

    So Trump talks down TikTok, hugely reducing the value of the brand in the US, and Microsoft gets to buy it at a bargain price.

    A triumph for free market economics and the president of its largest global practitioner.

    1. Chris G

      @Anonimouse

      It is called ' The Art Of The Deal'™

    2. Insert sadsack pun here

      We will know this is true if in x+1 years (where x is the year Trump leaves office) Melania is hired as Microsoft Ambassador for Social Media Kindness with a whacking great big salary.

    3. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

      Why?

      Microsoft are on a hiding to nothing here. They'll pay 'loadsamonry' for an asset that will be worthless inside a week.

      China is playing patsy with Trump and the so called author of 'The Art of the Deal' really is looking like a doofus.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Is M$ POTUS's official provider of IT services?

    He seems to have a vested interest in MS - first making sure they got awarded JEDI, now with a(nother) little word from Satya they are going to be 'allowed' to buy something that is not for sale.

    Wonder why they weren't up in front of the Judiciary committee with Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google?Maybe Satya had a quick chat with Trumpy. It's alright to have some types of monopoly I guess

    1. IGotOut Silver badge

      Re: Is M$ POTUS's official provider of IT services?

      Don't forget, Google can't "sell" to Huawei, but MS can.

      Guess their brown encelopes are the right size.

      1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

        Re: Is M$ POTUS's official provider of IT services?

        Trump is an Android

        He is running Windows Vista, or possibly ME

  8. Warm Braw

    Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

    I wonder how many whole weeks of revenue will accrue before fickle youth moves on to the next fad leaving TikTok sitting gloomily in the bus shelter next to Friends Reunited and MySpace, all staring silently into the distance.

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

      When MS bought Hotmail, it took them YEARS to wean Hotmail from BSD and *nix and onto Outlook mail server, and then it failed frequently because Outlook couldn't scale that well. So, even of MS do get to buy the US operations of TikToik, what are they getting? A licence to use TikTok in the US or the whole kit and kaboodle including the servers in China?

      1. John Jennings

        Re: Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

        The big thing they are getting is a license in the US to a massive music library thats used in the overlays in the tictoks ...

        probably transferable to other products in a limitted way too.

        thats likely a license to print money.

        1. PhilipN Silver badge

          Re: Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

          "massive music library"

          for a somewhat strained definition of "music"

    2. hoola Silver badge

      Re: Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

      I would expect them to use TikTok to continue to keep adding more useless features to the already next to useless Teams.

      Microsoft are simply incapable of doing almost anything properly now and this obsession with trying to push Social Media into the work environment is horrible.

      Maybe it is because I am an old fart but we have so many different ways of "collaborating" it is almost impossible to have any consistency. Teams, is full of "Teams" that you have been added to (whether you are interested or not" and then you have an endless stream of crap constantly spewing forth.

      And maybe they could do some do something useful like detect you have Teams installed before opening the fucking web page when you click on a link in an outlook email or not have the "call quality" message.

      1. EnviableOne

        Re: Completing these discussions no later than September 15, 2020

        could be just the boost they need for Teams for Home ....

  9. chivo243 Silver badge
    Trollface

    LMFTFY

    Trump told reporters that he intended to ban the app and prevent its sale to a US company for reasons he did not fully explain.

    Trump told reporters that he intended to ban the app and prevent its sale to a US company for reasons he "could" not fully explain.

    Just another case of Uncle Donnie getting mad and taking his ball and going home...

    1. Someone Else Silver badge

      Re: LMFTFY

      What ball is that? You mean Uncle Donnie has balls?

      1. Richard 12 Silver badge
        Alert

        Re: LMFTFY

        White ones, with dimples.

        He tries to hit them every few days at taxpayer expense.

        1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

          Re: LMFTFY

          He tries to hit them every few days at ginormous taxpayer expense.

          There fixed it for you.

          If he does not get a hole-in-one at every hole, the Secret Service put a spare ball in the pocket just to please their boss.

  10. Denis Frank

    Prev: TikTok users troll Trump rally.

    Next: Trump bans TikTok for reasons of national security.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      me thinks this is IT

      1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

        So if enough people troll him on Facebook - we can get it banned ?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Worth a go! No downsides to that plan, even if it doesn't work.

        2. Peter Ford

          Better still...

          ... troll Trump on Teams and get him to ban Microsoft : the whole world (well, except China) will benefit from that

    2. Someone Else Silver badge

      @ Denis Frank --

      Prev: TikTok users troll Trump rally.

      Next: Trump bans TikTok for reasons of national security stupidity.

      There, FTFY

  11. IGotOut Silver badge

    Shock

    Tik Tok beloved by liberal democratic voting youth.

    MS loved by middle aged and elderly business owners, more likely to vote Republican.

    Go figure.

  12. eldakka
    FAIL

    The post goes on to mention that if Microsoft were to buy TikTok it would conduct “a complete security review”, implement “world-class security, privacy, and digital safety protections”

    I'd just like to give a shout out to Windows 10's non-opt-outable1 telemetry!

    -------------------------------------------

    1: it can be disabled with 'hacks'. There are no set of simple toggles to disable telemetry that can be used by the average user. It's all intenionally burried under mountains of non-approved manual regedits (unless using 3rd-party apps or scripts like ShutUp10).

    1. Someone Else Silver badge

      Micros~1 : "world-class security :: matter : antimatter

  13. TrevorH

    Microsoft Teens...

    I thought it was already decided that it would be renamed Microsoft Teens...

    1. Robert Grant

      Re: Microsoft Teens...

      I think the working title is "Microsoft Data Capture, Teen Edition".

    2. BrownishMonstr
      Angel

      Re: Microsoft Teens...

      With a planned release of "Teens for Business".

  14. G28
    FAIL

    “Don’t worry Donald, we’ll take care of it”

    It’ll soon be dead, not because of anything that fool Trump does, but because MS will do what comes naturally to them and kill it in 6 months when they make changes to “consumer-centric features and functionalities”.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "they make changes"

      A.K.A. "make it better".

      1. PhilipN Silver badge

        Re: "they make changes"

        NO - no - no : MS Speak is always "make it EVEN better"

    2. N2
      Trollface

      Re: “Don’t worry Donald, we’ll take care of it”

      And no one will be able to use it after a Tuesday 'update'

    3. Paradroid

      Re: “Don’t worry Donald, we’ll take care of it”

      Exactly, their acquisition history is littered with failure, and even things doing ok like LinkedIn are underperforming hugely. LinkedIn could have transformed the job market, instead it's a barely-alive job advert site with a Facebook Wall clone for shameless self-promotion.

      1. vogon00

        Re: “Don’t worry Donald, we’ll take care of it”

        "shameless self-promotion" is all there is left to get noticed with these days. It's hard to stand out any more amongst all the other BS and 'noise'.

        I may be old and grouchy, but my rep is based on making things work, as designed and then as necessary if the original design doesn't cut it for whatever reason(s) - at small, large and national scale. It makes me a pain in the arse for some people*, but the majority of the end users are happy.

  15. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge
    Joke

    Ding Dong

    Microsoft could purchase and then rename it to "Ding Dong" - with permission from Leslie Phillips/he could front the ads for them

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not going to happen

    Trump is in a childish strop with tik-tok after some of its users trolled him. https://www.forbes.com/sites/abrambrown/2020/08/01/is-this-the-real-reason-why-trump-wants-to-ban-tiktok/#1502db664aed

    It's got nothing to do with security. He just wants to ban it to get his revenge (just like China bans Winnie the pooh, and Kim J-U and his fantastical PR, these dictator-types are very insecure)

    Just like the Huawei ban that he said he'd lift if China gave him a good trade deal.

    1. PhilipN Silver badge

      Re: Not going to happen

      He's throwing a Ballmer "I want Google dead" tantrum (and we all know how that went) as part of the US wetting itself at China's progress in technology.

      It was never anything to do with trade. The energy the US spent on attacking Huawei was 100 times more than they spent attacking China's exports.

      and especially with the latest poll results and TikTok being used by 100M traitors oops voters.

  17. Rich 2 Silver badge

    It’s all bollocks

    No idea what MS are up to - apart from the obvious tired idea of buying a company that has an interesting and popular product, and then running it into the ground with “enhancements” and “innovations” that make it utterly unusable - but Trump really is a cockwomble of the highest order. He wants to ban tiktok because it’s slurping the private details of good ol’ God-fearing AMERICANS (never understood why one is supposed to be afraid of ones chosen deity, but I digress). And he might well be correct in his assessment - I don’t know - but at the same time he (in fact the US gov in general) couldn’t give a gnats bollock about googlies, faecesbook etc etc doing exactly the same thing and selling the details of good ol’ God-fearing AMERICANS to the highest bidder.

    What a messed up “free” country they have there

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It’s all bollocks

      "What a messed up “free” country they have there"

      It's not a free country, as either in beer or in speech. Everything there is paid for, be it paid in dollars (for healthcare, fast food or influence) or paid in freedom (so to appear to be part of the Great American Dream and not end up shovelling burgers or living in cardboard). Not that our corner of the universe is yugely or bigly better.

    2. PhilipN Silver badge

      Re: It’s all bollocks

      FYI I learned (as just one example) a great deal more about the BLM protests (and all that went with it) from TikTok than I learnt from Western media. Truth must be stopped! Citizens cannot handle the truth!

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    This is excellent news...

    ...if you work in, or have shares in any other social media platform.

    Microsoft will work their 'magic' on Tik Tok which will soon start circling the drain. It couldn't happen to a nicer platform.

    1. Adrian 4

      Re: This is excellent news...

      Don't care much about whether Tik Tok survives, except that the more competitors facebook has, the better.

  19. Dwarf

    Wrist watches

    Did trump just learn about wrist watches ?

    Look at my tick tock..

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Blustering Trump behind it.

    ‘Appreciates President Trump’s personal involvement’. Ha! Crawler. WTF has it REALLY got to do with him? Dodgy TikTok app, or not, this is probably another case of ol' Trumpy boy leaning on a company or using some sort of not-so-subtle blackmail, sticking his obnoxious nose into somebody's business to gain a bit of political advantage and further his nasty little scheme to become the great orange fascist dictator of America.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Blustering Trump behind it.

      The bizarre part of this is that the US Gov is *directly* interfering in the operations of a private IT company. That's exactly what the US Gov objects to other governments doing.

      Just the hypothetical notion that the Chinese Gov might, in the future, interfere in Huawei is enough to ban Huawei. Trump then dos exactly that with Microsoft (and Google, and ARM, etc.). Trump tells US IT companies what to do, and they do it.

  21. Zippy´s Sausage Factory
    Devil

    Just why Microsoft wants TikTok is another matter entirely.

    It's probably the same reason that they wanted - and made such a success of - acquisitions such as the mobile phone makers Danger or Nokia.

    1. Sanctimonious Prick

      I truly love what MS did with the Nokia Mobile Division.

  22. mark l 2 Silver badge

    The US claims they are banning TIkTok on US national security grounds because the data is all sent back to servers in China where they could be accessed by the Chinese authorities. But considering the app is mainly teenagers lip syncing and dancing to pop song I fail to see how that is a national security concern?

    It once again the orange one using a Chinese based company in his own personal war on China who he currently blames for the corona virus which has caused his approval rating to get hammered in the polls because he handled it soooo badly from the beginning.

    As for MS buying Tiktok I am sure they will go well, I mean Microsoft are well know for improving platforms they purchase and making them much better. Just look at how well they have done after purchasing Nokia and Skype :D

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I think there is a potential security issue, especially as the current Tik Tok users age and start getting involved in stuff that would be more valuable to China. However, there is also a "How can we stick it to China today?" aspect of this.

    2. AJ MacLeod

      Nobody was suggesting that it was the brain dead content of TikTok videos that was of interest to the CCP. Having malware installed on millions of powerful mobile computers with cameras, microphones and wireless network access on the other hand is the sort of thing "intelligence" agencies a just few years ago could hardly of dreamed about.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Devil

    Microsoft PowerTikTok Teams 365

    How did I do? Too soon? Or too late?

  24. nxnwest

    TikTay, TikTeams

    TikTay or TikTeams or maybe TikTayTeams. Some Rebranding Required...

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Windows

    Other name idea!

    Microsoft Tik Tok Cash Lock

  26. JohnMurray

    He's obviously does not like comedian Sarah Coopers miming his speeches/rants (delete as inappropriate)

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Trump, Microsoft, & Nadella can fuck right off

  28. devTrail

    Conspiracy theory

    Among the other rumours I read that TikTok is asking more than 10 billion dollars just for the US branch of the company. So my conspiracy theory is that Nadella asked Trump to start a show with his usual threats to push down the price.

  29. devTrail

    Expertise

    I don't know very much about TikTok, but from the description I read it seems to fall well within Microsoft expertise. They screwed Skype, they screwed LinkedIn, surely they'll know how to screw TikTok.

    1. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

      Re: They screwed Skype, they screwed LinkedIn

      You've hit the nail on the head.

      Yes, I know, but with a big enough hammer the effect is the same.

  30. spold Silver badge

    Looking forward to....

    Bytedance buying Microsoft China...

    Douyin users worrying about their data ending up in the US...

    Uploading your TikTok videos to LinkedIn...

    Lip-syncing to Satya's shareholder briefings....

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Sell Tik Tok or we ban it and you lose everything? Oh and by the way we're taking a massive chunk of the sale price.

    Um.

    Since when did the USA become a gangster state that expropriated companies? Can China complain to the WTO? Sanction the USA?

  32. Phil Kingston

    Today Trump talks tremendous tik tok takeover

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Tulsa

    Trump only wants to ban TikTok because a large group of people claim to have used the app to arrange to request tickets for the Tulsa rally and not turn up. Whether or not this is actually the reason why a million tickets were requested but only a few rednecks turned up, Trump thinks it is so wants his revenge.

  34. thondwe

    US only content

    MS would only get US (+ Canada/Oz and NZ) users - so does that cut Tik Tok users and content in half? How does this partition work at all??

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's the Recommendation Engine Stupid!

    This has nothing to do with the user data, everyone already spies on and sells the same data to anyone with enough cash.

    This is about who controls the recommendation engine and what gets nudged to the top. The orange lump thinks if MS owns Tick Tock, they will bury Sara Coopers entries mocking the lump.

    == DUMP THE LUMP 2020 ==

  36. steviebuk Silver badge

    Confused how this works

    So they sell the American arm due to be forced with a threat of a ban so they want to get some money for it. However, now what would happen? If MS buy it they now have all the code and tech and can check if its secure (any backdoors will be religiously removed before the sale so won't show anything). But they now have their own US tiktok? That is in competition with China? Or not because it won't be available in China?

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