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Delivering Sahuaro's Cutting Edge News & Saving Trees

The Paper Cut

Delivering Sahuaro's Cutting Edge News & Saving Trees

The Paper Cut

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The End of an Era

Goodbye TikTok?
In+this+photo+illustration%2C+the+TikTok+logo+is+being+displayed+on+a+phone+screen+seen+through+broken+glass%2C+with+an+American+flag+appearing+on+a+screen+in+the+background+in+Athens%2C+Greece%2C+on+April+25%2C+2024.+%28Photo+by+Nikolas+Kokovlis%2FNurPhoto+via+Getty+Images%29
NurPhoto via Getty Images
In this photo illustration, the TikTok logo is being displayed on a phone screen seen through broken glass, with an American flag appearing on a screen in the background in Athens, Greece, on April 25, 2024. (Photo by Nikolas Kokovlis/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

TikTok has been vital to almost every young person’s life since 2018. You can say whatever you want about the platform TikTok has, but you can’t deny that it changed the world one step at a time. The Senate passed a bill on Tuesday that would restrict TikTok, a historic development in government regulation of social media.  TikTok is a place where people of different backgrounds can express themselves and taking that away is like taking away our First Amendment right of free expression and speech. Unfortunately, President Joe Biden signed a bill Wednesday that could lead to a ban on TikTok, but the app won’t be cut off from its millions of American users just yet.

The debate over TikTok’s future is about not only free expression online and the future of social media, but also how Americans think about data security and who’s deciding what they see online. TikTok plans to take the Biden administration to court over the law. TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew said he is confident TikTok would win in court, adding that users should not expect issues with the app in the meantime. “Rest assured, we aren’t going anywhere,” Chew said in a video posted on TikTok. The law has a built-in delay of nine months, and China can sell the app to the U.S. rather than facing a national prohibition. If the app is sold every video we watch will be evaluated from now on and huge restrictions will be in place. People all around the U.S. are protesting for the right to have TikTok and not have it taken away or sold off somewhere where everything you do on it will be controlled.

The president also has the authority to issue a 90-day extension for ByteDance, a parent company, to sell TikTok, which would push the deadline to April of next year. Even with the extension, some critics of the bill have said it is not a long enough timeline for a sale of this size. This isn’t a huge solution, but it’s a start to not getting rid of TikTok.

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About the Contributor
Montana Poe
Montana Poe is a junior at Sahuaro High School. She aspires to be a journalist in her near future. She is very excited for new fun experiences in her second year in The Paper Cut. In Montana's free time she enjoys practicing and playing volleyball, playing video games, and spending time with her family. She has four brothers who are all older than her but love her very much. She plays club volleyball and volleyball at Sahuaro High School if she could, she would play a lot more sports. Montana has always loved talking and writing about things that are happening in the world around her and in day-to-day life. She wants to travel and see things that maybe some day she can write about. Most of all she want to make her dad who has recently passed away proud because she cares about what he thought and wanted in her future.

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