A McCourt-backed “people’s bid” to buy TikTok in the US is gathering steam, in a move that could radically reshape the controversial social media app and its mysterious algorithms.
Project Liberty is a consortium led by billionaire entrepreneur and former owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team, Frank McCourt, who has brought in investment banks, academics, technologists and citizens in a bid to migrate the TikTok platform to open-source protocols, and “safeguard the health and well-being of our children, families, democracy and society.”
Aiding those efforts is Audrey Tang, a Taiwanese politician and programmer who until recently served as Taiwan’s first-ever minister of digital affairs, as well as the first trans and non-binary Taiwanese government minister.
Tang, who has been appointed a Senior Fellow with Project Liberty Institute, is visiting Australia and will address the National Press Club in Canberra on Thursday. They have been brought to Australia by Per Capita’s The Centre of the Public Square, an initiative to build platforms for better public discussions.
“I’m helping the team that is now attempting to purchase TikTok US and turn it into a co-operative, basically, that can be governed democratically, so that everybody has a choice of recommendation, algorithm and also a voice,” Tang said in an interview.
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