How the TikTok Law Could Intensify the US-China Tech Spat

Gianna Christine began her career as a social media influencer four years ago, after the professor in her college digital media class assigned students to post every day on the video streaming service TikTok. Since then, she’s built an audience of 2.7 million fans on the app and earned a six-figure annual income, talking into her iPhone about everything from awkward encounters with neighbors in her New York City apartment building to the best post-clubbing late-night snacks.

Recently, though, Christine, like other TikTok stars, started to post more frequently on other services such as Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube. These efforts started in 2020, when then-President Donald Trump raised the prospect of banning TikTok, and intensified during the past few weeks as Congress suddenly advanced a bill that would remove TikTok from US app stores within nine months unless its Chinese parent sells it to an American company. The punishment would effectively kill the app by preventing distribution and even routine software updates. Christine, like many of her fellow TikTok users, views the law as the beginning of the end of TikTok in the US. “People are angry about it. We love the community,” she says. “But there’s acceptance, too. I don’t want to lose my income if it gets taken down.”