Following similar measures taken by Big Tech companies like Facebook, Twitter, Twitch and YouTube, TikTok officially announced the removal of President Trump's videos from their platform, a report reveals.
All videos linked to the President deemed as in violation of their "misinformation content policy" and community guidelines will be automatically deleted, TechCrunch reported. These include contents uploaded and shared via the President's Twitter account which rapidly circulated online. The recent one was flagged as inciting violence and dissent.
Additionally, the video sharing app owned by Chinese company ByteDance will block all videos of President Trump that have "claims" of election fraud - even when there are evidence backing the President's assertions.
Although the President has not signed up for TikTok, the reach of his videos to all demographics in other social media sites goes far. Pro-Trump protestors used hashtags which broadened the visibility of the video post. TikTok employees will work round the clock to decrease its discoverability by blocking tags promoting violence like #StormTheCapitol. Only the media and news sites were allowed access.
"Hateful behavior and violence have no place on TikTok," says a spokesperson for the popular video sharing app.
TikTok users who do counter speeches or just commentaries on the President's speech are also allowed provided that they do not "promote" or "support" the violence enacted on Wednesday.
It's worth noting that the Trump supporters who went to Capitol Hill were infiltrated by leftists from Antifa, Black Lives Matter, and Insurgency USA. Some Trump supporters even stopped thugs from causing damage to federal property.
Posts containing footages of the protests but by users condemning the riot are not censored. This led to other users finding creative means like clever video edits, altering their word choices in their presentations, and sometimes, intentionally misspelling their hashtags.
What's in the Video?
Here's the transcript of the video that got the President's virtual accounts suspended:
"I know your pain. I know you are hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election and everyone knows it, especially the other side. But you have to go home now.
We have to have peace. We have to have law and order. We have to respect our great people in law and order. We don't want anybody hurt.
It's a very tough period of time. There's never been a time like this, where such a thing happened, where they could take it away from all of us; from me, from you, from our country. This was a fraudulent election.
But we can't play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace. So go home. We love you, you're very special, you've seen what happens, you see the way others are treated who are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel. But go home, and go home in peace."
A Suggestion for the President to Consider TikTok for His 2024 Campaign
New York magazine Intelligencer thinks that should the President launch another presidential campaign in 2024, TikTok is the ideal platform to give him a boost in publicity.
TikTok now has about 100 million users in the U.S. with the majority spending a great deal of time on the app.
The question is, will TikTok welcome President Trump in their space after his efforts to ban their operations last year?
