Following today’s ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals affirming TikTok’s parent company ByteDance must divest its U.S. operations, Frank McCourt, Founder of Project Liberty and the catalyst behind The People’s Bid for TikTok released the following statement:
“Today, the justice system made their vision for America’s digital future clear. This is a landmark decision not only for the future of the platform, but also for the movement for online privacy and safety, which millions of Americans want and deserve. Now that the Court has spoken, The People’s Bid is prepared to move forward with our bid for TikTok – which brings together a wide network of supporters and experts across policy, technology, and civil society committed to preserving the platform’s rich creative community, while also protecting the personal information of millions of Americans. We are going to rebuild TikTok and prove that it’s possible to enjoy the internet without sacrificing our privacy and safety.”
The People’s Bid has attracted a deep bench of supporters from across finance, policy, technology, and civil society spheres, including Jonathan Haidt, renowned social psychologist and author of New York Times bestseller “The Anxious Generation,” Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Chief Technology Officer & Co-Founder of Inrupt, Director of the open-source protocol, Solid, Deb Schmill, Mother of Becca, Founder and President of the Becca Schmill Foundation, David Clark, Senior Research Scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, DSNP Advisor, Governor Spencer Cox, Governor of Utah and Outgoing Chair of the National Governors Association, Maria Schneider, Grammy Award-winning Musician as well as over thousands of concerned citizens.
Launched in 2019, Project Liberty builds solutions that help people take back control of their digital lives by reclaiming a voice, choice, and stake in a better internet. Last May, Project Liberty announced The People’s Bid for TikTok with the backing of Guggenheim Securities, the investment banking and capital markets business of Guggenheim Partners, and Kirkland & Ellis, one of the world’s largest law firms. The People’s Bid aims to capitalize on the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to redesign TikTok to help Americans reclaim their digital independence and, for the first time, give TikTok’s users and creators control of their own online data.
ABOUT PROJECT LIBERTY
Project Liberty is leading the movement to give people back control of their lives in the digital age by ensuring they have a voice, choice, and stake in a better internet. Started in 2019 and publicly launched in 2021 by civic entrepreneur Frank McCourt and supported by a $500-million commitment, Project Liberty includes the work of the Project Liberty Institute—a 501(c)(3) with an international partner network that includes Georgetown University, Stanford University, ETH in Zurich, and other leading academic institutions and civic organizations—and a technological team that is focused on developing the next generation of digital infrastructure. Project Liberty’s activities include the release of the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP), which is stewarded by the Institute and available as a public utility to serve as the bedrock of a more equitable web and support a new era of innovation that empowers people over platforms and serves the common good.
Read the original release here.