ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming advised workers on Tuesday there have been misunderstandings on Chinese language social media about TikTok’s state of affairs in the USA and that the corporate may face extra difficulties as anti-Chinese language sentiment rose overseas.
His feedback in a letter to ByteDance’s Chinese language workers got here after the corporate and Zhang had been closely criticised on Chinese language social media for coming into into talks with Microsoft to promote TikTok’s US operations.
Chinese language media first reported the contents of the interior letter. A supply confirmed the content material of the memo to Reuters.
ByteDance didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
“I really perceive (the criticism),” Zhang mentioned within the letter. “Individuals have excessive expectations of an organization based by a Chinese language individual which goes international however have little details about it. With a lot of grievances in direction of the US authorities, they have an inclination to lash out at us with harsh criticism.”
Since Monday, some customers of China’s Twitter-like Weibo have mentioned they’d uninstall ByteDance’s Chinese language quick video app Douyin and information aggregator Jinri Toutiao as a result of they believed ByteDance had given in too shortly to Washington.
Others urged ByteDance to study from US big Google, which opted to tug its search engine out of the Chinese language market in 2010 after China requested it to censor its search outcomes, reasonably than promoting off its Chinese language operations.
Zhang mentioned some individuals had misunderstood the US state of affairs. He mentioned Washington’s objective was to not drive a sale of TikTok’s US operations via the Committee of Overseas Funding within the US (CFIUS) however to ban the app, and there was a authorized course of ByteDance had no alternative however to observe.
Zhang advised workers on Monday in one other inside letter that the corporate had began talks with a tech firm so it may proceed to supply the TikTok app in the USA.
US President Donald Trump initially dismissed the concept of promoting TikTok’s US operations to Microsoft however modified his thoughts following strain from some advisers and plenty of within the Republican occasion, as a result of banning TikTok may alienate many younger voters, Reuters has reported.
Zhang additionally advised workers that over the past two years, anti-Chinese language sentiment had risen in lots of international locations and the corporate should brace for extra difficulties within the present environment.
© Thomson Reuters 2020
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