A TikTok ban in the US that's been in the works for years started early on Saturday with the company locking down US users but the entire saga remains more about politics than national security.TikTokAs of January 19, 2025, TikTok is no longer accessible within the US. The app is being removed from Apple's App Store and the Google Play Store, plus Oracle must now stop hosting the service's US user data.Those existing users will see only an explanatory pop-up message on launching the app. TikTok's owners, Chinese firm ByteDance, is said to be working to allow users to download their data and personal information. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums

PinPINNEDTODAY, 37 minutes agoRichard LawlerTikTok is down in the US Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikTok has gone dark in the US now that the ban-or-divest law passed last year is taking effect. The app has been removed from both Apple and Googles app stores, its unavailable on the web, and users who open the app are blocked from viewing videos.The shutdown has the astonishing effect of removing a social network used by 170 million people in the US, according to TikToks own numbers. While other social media platforms have experienced outages, even prolonged ones, no network as big as TikTok has simply shut down without any indication of if or when it will come back online.Read Article >TODAY, 41 minutes agoBarbara KrasnoffHow to bulk download and save your TikTok videos Illustration by Samar Haddad / The VergeTheres a general sense of doom on the TikTok feeds these days, and no wonder: it looks like the video service may be banned in the US as of January 19th. TikTok creators are offering satirical goodbyes to their Chinese spies and wondering how quickly they can download the several hundred or thousand videos they have up on the service.TikTok itself apparently doesnt like the idea of allowing its creators to bulk download their videos. You can download in TXT or JSON format a certain amount of your data, which, according to the support page, may include but is not limited to your username, watch video history, comment history, and privacy settings. When I tried it, it did not include my videos.Read Article >TODAY, Two hours agoAlex HeathTikTok will be temporarily unavailable in the US starting tonight Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikTok is officially going dark in the United States now that a federal ban on the app is set to go into effect on January 19th. Around 9PM ET, the app began notifying people in the US, including Verge staffers, with a message that said the ban would make our services temporarily unavailable. The message goes on to say, Were working to restore our service in the US as quickly as possible, an outcome that will require action from the incoming Trump administration one way or another. A similar message is showing up in the CapCut video editor, which is also owned by TikTok.Read Article >Jan 18Wes DavisBiden White House says TikToks threat to go dark is a stunt Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesWhite House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called TikToks threat to go dark on Sunday, January 19th, a stunt, and that there is no reason for TikTok to shut itself down before President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in on the 20th.It is a stunt, and we see no reason for TikTok or other companies to take actions in the next few days before the Trump Administration takes office on Monday, MSNBC quotes Jean-Pierre as saying. We have laid out our position clearly and straightforwardly: actions to implement this law will fall to the next administration.So TikTok and other companies should take up any concerns with them.Read Article >Jan 18Alex HeathTikTok says it will go offline on Sunday if Biden doesnt intervene Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikTok says it plans to go offline on Sunday, January 19th if the Biden administration doesnt intervene.The company confirms earlier reporting that it will be forced to go dark on the 19th unless the outgoing administration provides a definitive statement assuring its most critical service providers that they wont be held liable for breaking the law. Those providers include Apple and Google, which together distribute TikTok through their app stores, and its hosting partners, which include Amazon and Oracle.Read Article >Jan 18Alex HeathHow TikTok backed itself into a corner Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesYoud think that TikTok would have a Plan B by now.Its now clear the company never planned for a scenario in which it would lose to the Supreme Court. Maybe it couldnt, given that the Chinese government ultimately has final say on a sale. Now, TikToks leaders are banking on Donald Trump to save them in a last-ditch effort that will unquestionably come with strings attached.Read Article >Jan 17Alex HeathTikTok tells advertisers its optimistic about finding the best path forward.The app is set to be shut off in the US at midnight on Saturday after losing its appeal to the Supreme Court. TikTok president Blake Chandlee just sent this to advertisers:This is a rapidly evolving situation, and were working quickly with our legal and policy teams to assess the situation and provide clear, accurate updates for our valued partners. Were optimistic about finding the best path forward.Rest assured, well be in touch with more details and next steps ahead of the Sunday, January 19 deadline.He then links to CEO Shou Chews reaction video, which makes clear the company is banking on Trump saving it from a ban.Jan 17Lauren FeinerThe Supreme Court ruled on TikTok and nobody knows what comes next Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesNow that TikTok has finally reached the end of its legal options in the US to avoid a ban, somehow, its future seems less clear than ever. The Supreme Court couldnt have been more direct: the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, as applied to TikTok, withstands First Amendment scrutiny and can take effect on January 19th. The court agreed that the government had a compelling national security interest in passing the law and that its rationale was content neutral. The solution proposed forcing Chinese parent company ByteDance to divest TikTok or see it ousted from the US was ruled appropriately tailored to meet those ends. Read Article >Jan 17Lauren FeinerTikTok CEO flatters Trump ahead of US ban deadline Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesIn his first statement since the Supreme Court upheld a law that could ban TikTok from the US on Sunday, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew offered no insight into what would happen to the app in just a few days. Instead, he took the opportunity to appeal to President-elect Donald Trump.I want to thank President Trump for his commitment to work with us to find a solution that keeps TikTok available in the United States, Chew says in a video on the platform. We are grateful and pleased to have the support of a President who truly understands our platform one who has used TikTok to express his own thoughts and perspectives, connecting with the world and generating more than 60 billion views of his content in the process.Read Article >Jan 17Lauren FeinerSupreme Court upholds TikTok ban law Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesThe Supreme Court ruled that the law that could oust TikTok from the US unless Chinese parent company ByteDance sells it is constitutional as applied to the company. There is no doubt that, for more than 170 million Americans, TikTok offers a distinctive and expansive outlet for expression, means of engagement, and source of community, the court wrote in a per curiam ruling, which is not attributed to any particular justice. But Congress has determined that divestiture is necessary to address its well-supported national security concerns regarding TikToks data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary.Read Article >Jan 17Lauren FeinerTrump says he talked to Chinas President Xi about TikTok.We dont know exactly what they discussed, but the US President-elect says it was a very good call. Until we hear otherwise from the Supreme Court or President Joe Biden, the TikTok ban is set to take effect on January 19th one day before Trumps inauguration. It is my expectation that we will solve many problems together, and starting immediately, says Trump.Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)[Truth Social]Jan 17Mia Sato6 TikTok creators on where theyll go if the app is banned Cath Virginia / The Verge | Photo by Brendan Hoffman, Getty ImagesIts been more than four years since Donald Trump first moved to expel TikTok from the US and now, just days before a second Trump presidency begins, it just might happen.President Joe Biden signed legislation last April that officially began the countdown that would force TikToks parent company, ByteDance, to divest from the US business. But even afterward,Read Article >Jan 16Lauren FeinerBiden punts the TikTok ban to Trump Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesThe Biden administration says it will leave it to incoming President Donald Trump to figure out how to deal with the mess of the TikTok ban, ABC News reports.Our position on this has been clear: TikTok should continue to operate under American ownership, a White House official told ABC News. Given the timing of when it goes into effect over a holiday weekend a day before inauguration, it will be up to the next administration to implement. Read Article >Jan 16Will RedNote get banned in the US? Image: Cath Virginia / The VergeIm not the first to note the irony of TikTok users flooding RedNote this week. The TikTok divest-or-ban rule was supposed to drive Americans away from a foreign-owned social network that was subject to influence or data harvesting by the Chinese government. Instead, it pushed them onto a different foreign-owned social network that poses the exact same hypothetical risks and that might be subject to the exact same kind of ban.TikTok faces a ban under the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which passed with overwhelming bipartisan support and was signed last year by President Joe Biden (who is reportedly experiencing some buyers remorseRead Article >Jan 16Gaby Del ValleAs Americans flock to RedNote, privacy advocates warn about surveillance Image: Cath Virginia / The VergeMore than 700,000 US-based users have downloaded RedNote, a popular Chinese social app, as the TikTok ban deadline looms but they may find themselves looking for yet another TikTok alternative soon. A US official told CBS News that Xiaohongshu, the app more commonly referred to as RedNote, has many of the same issues that caused Congress to ban TikTok and that the app could eventually face a similar ban unless it divests from its China-based parent company.This appears to be the kind of app that the statute would apply to and could face the same restrictions as TikTok if its not divested, the anonymous official told CBS News on Thursday, referring to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, the bill under which Congress banned TikTok.Read Article >Jan 15Lauren FeinerDonald Trump is reportedly considering an executive order to delay the TikTok ban.It would suspend enforcement of the law for 60 to 90 days, extending the timeline for a sale, The Washington Post reports. Trumps AG pick Pam Bondi also wouldnt commit to enforcing the TikTok law. But either of those routes wouldnt eliminate the risk of Apple and Google hosting the app on their app stores after January 19th.Trump considers executive order hoping to save TikTok from ban or sale in U.S. law[The Washington Post]Jan 14Lauren FeinerCan Elon Musk really save TikTok? Laura Normand / The VergeChinese officials are reportedly exploring a backup plan for TikTok after the Supreme Court appeared unlikely to save it from a US ban.The kicker? China is reportedly mulling having President-elect Donald Trumps favorite tech billionaire, Elon Musk, act either as broker or buyer in the arrangement. Reports from the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg all citing unnamed sources indicate that Chinese officials are at least discussing the option of a sale. TikTok spokesperson Michael Hughes has called the reports pure fiction. The Chinese embassy in the US and Musks existing social media company, X, did not respond to requests for comment.Read Article >Jan 14Emma RothRedNote: what its like using the Chinese app TikTokers are flocking to Image: Cath Virginia / The VergeInstead of wallowing in misery about potentially losing access to their favorite short-form video app, many TikTokers are flocking to RedNote, a Chinese social media platform also called Xiaohongshu. Ive decided to spend some time on the platform myself, and it looks like so-called TikTok refugees are excited about interacting with a community mainly comprised of Chinese-speaking users and vice versa.Launched in 2013 as a shopping platform, RedNote has grown into one of Chinas most popular social apps featuring photos, videos, and written content. Now its seeing another spike in users from another part of the globe, with more than 700,000 users joining RedNote in just two days, according to a report from Reuters. The number is still small, at just a fraction of the 150 million Americans TikTok reported were already using the app in early 2023.Read Article >Jan 14Alex HeathTikTok is planning for various scenarios ahead of possible US ban Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikToks executives are planning for various scenarios ahead of the Supreme Court likely upholding a US ban of the app.In an internal memo obtained by The Verge, employees were told that the company is continuing to plan the way forward ahead of the courts imminent decision, which is expected as soon as Wednesday, January 15th. Read Article >Jan 14Lauren FeinerTikTok could get a 270-day extension to make a deal Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikToks luck might not run out just yet, if a new bill extending its January 19th deadline for a sale is approved by Congress.Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), announced on the Senate floor Monday that he plans to introduce the Extend the TikTok Deadline Act to give the company an extra 270 days to divest from its Chinese parent company ByteDance to avoid facing a ban in the US. The bill notably wouldnt overturn Congress initial bill, but it would give the company more time to make a deal, as its legal options dry out. The Supreme Court is expected to decide this week whether the initial law, the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, violates the First Amendment, as applied to TikTok but many court-watchers predict the ruling is unlikely to go in TikToks favor. Read Article >Jan 14David PierceThe TikTok ban, and what comes next Image: Alex Parkin / The VergeGoodbye to our personal Chinese spies. With five days left until the date by which TikTok is to be either sold or banned in the United States, millions of users are reckoning with what happens when one of the internets most important media platforms just up and disappears. (Or, more likely, sticks around for a while, consistently gets worse, and then dies with a whimper.) On this episode of The Vergecast, we reckon with how we got here, and where we go next. The Verges Lauren Feiner walks us through the years-long history of the fight over TikTok, and takes us inside last weeks Supreme Court hearing, where the countrys highest court appeared to be in favor of the ban. Even with a few days left, though, the storys not over: Donald Trump has said he wants to save the app, and hell be inaugurated as president the day after the ban is set to go into effect. And now there are rumors Elon Musk might be involved with the apps future, too. If weve learned one thing about the TikTok ban, its that its always coming and seemingly never actually here. But it sure feels close now.Read Article >Jan 14Jay PetersElon Musk may be in the mix to buy TikTok.Under one scenario thats been discussed by the Chinese government, Musks X the former Twitter would take control of TikTok US and run the businesses together, the people said, Bloomberg reports.TikTok spokesperson MichaelHughes tells The Verge that we cant be expected to comment on pure fiction.China Weighs Sale of TikTok's US Operations to Elon Musk as One Possible Option[Bloomberg]Jan 13Emma RothGoodbye to my Chinese spy might be the last great TikTok trend Image: Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty ImagesTikTokers are coping with the apps potential ban with an unusual trend: by bidding farewell to their personal Chinese spy. The trend, which pokes fun at security concerns surrounding the app, has users thanking their spy for surveilling them and filling their For You page with entertaining content, while others proclaim that theyd rather share their data directly with the Chinese government than switch to Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts.One post, which garnered more than 1.5 million likes, depicts an emotional scene from Squid Game with the caption, Me saying goodbye to my Chinese spy on the 19th (He perfected my algorithm). Other TikTokers are speaking and singing in Chinese, while some pretend to be the spies powering individual algorithms.Read Article >Jan 13Emma RothChinese social media app RedNote tops App Store chart ahead of TikTok ban Photo Illustration by Sheldon Cooper/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty ImagesRedNote, the Chinese social media app also known as Xiaohongshu, rose to the number one spot on the Apple App Store as a US ban closes in on TikTok. The app offers a mix of pictures, short-form videos, and text posts across follow, explore, and nearby feeds.A cursory scroll through RedNotes Explore page shows English-language posts scattered among those written in Chinese. Many American users call themselves TikTok refugees in videos, while others write in text posts that theyre in search of a new community because of the potential TikTok ban. Some are even asking questions to Chinese users, such as What are some popular memes in China?Read Article >Jan 12Alex HeathNice shot, Mr. President! Can I buy TikTok?Kevin OLearyrecently joined Frank McCourts bid to buy TikTok. Now, with TikTok facing a ban in one week, the Shark Tank host is playing golf with the President-elect. Hmm.

If you've felt a vibe shift, you're not alone: there's a massive revolution afoot, led by "America-hating communists."At least, that's according to Marc Andreessen, the cofounder of the powerful venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, which has made immense sums of money by investing in tech companies ranging from Facebook to Airbnb and is now a key player in the nascent AI industry.Lately, though, Andreessen has been troubled. Elite institutions, he says, have been churning out radicalized graduates who are destroying his companies from the inside."I believe its the children of the elites," he told New York Times columnist Ross Douthat this week. "The most privileged people in society, the most successful, send their kids to the most politically radical institutions, which teach them how to be America-hating communists.""There was a point where the median, newly arrived Harvard kid in 2006 was a career obsessed striver," he seethed, but by "2013, the median newly arrived Harvard kid was like: '[expletive] it. Were burning the system down. You are all evil. White people are evil. All men are evil. Capitalism is evil. Tech is evil.'"Pretty soon, Andreessen says these little monsters ended up at his various companies, where they start sowing havoc."Theyre professional activists in their own minds, first and foremost," Andreessen fumed. "And it just turns out the way to exercise professional activism right now, most effectively, is to go and destroy a company from the inside."Does any of this particularly hold up to scrutiny? Not really; in reality, Americans' ideological beliefs have remained relatively stable over the past three decades, and the tech industry has remained staggeringly profitable. There's also a tension that's hard to reconcile: if Andreessen and his deputies are so brilliant at founding and managing startups, why are they constantly hiring saboteurs instead of qualified candidates?But what does emerge is an unintentionally revealing self-portrait of one of the most influential men in the AI industry. Andreessen feels besieged, paranoid that a deep state of his own employees is tearing down his companies from within. One reasonable interpretation: whether he's right or wrong about that hypothesis, it's spurring him to throw money at startups aiming to automate the work of the regular employees he feels so betrayed by.How are those AI investments going? As Andreessen continued to unload on Douthat, a new target emerged: the Biden administration, which the venture capitalist raged has been trying to kneecap the AI sector before it can get off the ground.Senior Biden staffers, Andreessen said, told him in meetings that "we are going to make sure that AI is going to be a function of two or three large companies. We will directly regulate and control those companies. There will be no startups.""And thats the day we walked out and stood in the parking lot of the West Wing," he continued, "and took one look at each other, and were like, 'Yep, were for Trump.'"Again, it's difficult to square Andreessen's storytelling with reality. Thereare plenty ofAI startups, many of which he's invested in, from ChatGPT maker OpenAI to military contractor Anduril. If the White House has been trying to kill the sector, it's doing a remarkably incompetent job, because the AI industry been growing explosively throughout Biden's term. And, as a point of fact, Biden's attempts at AI regulation have been mild and vague.Moreover, when AI startups have run into trouble, it's very often come in the form of self-inflicted wounds as they deploy technology they don't understand and have difficulty controlling.Look no further than Character.AI, a chatbot company started by Google defectors, into which Andreessen Horowitz has poured $150 million. The company rapidly gathered a large userbase among teenagers and younger kids until it turned out the company's bots had been keeping underage users engaged by plying them with inappropriate roleplay about sexual scenarios, suicide and self-harm, eating disorders, school shootings, and more (the company is now the subject of two lawsuits, one holding it accountable for the suicide a 14-year-old who developed an intimate relationship with one of the company's bots.)Is any of that the fault of overzealous government regulators? Obviously not, but at this point it doesn't even matter. When Donald Trump is sworn in, the Andreessens of the world won't have Biden to blame anymore, and the AI industry will either have to find a working revenue model or develop a new excuse for why it's failing."The metaphor that I use here is were the dog that caught the bus," Andreessen conceded to Douthat, "and we got the tailpipe firmly between our jaws, and the bus is dragging us down the street."Share This Article

TikTok has gone dark in the US now that the ban-or-divest law passed last year is taking effect. The app has been removed from both Apple and Googles app stores, its unavailable on the web, and users who open the app are blocked from viewing videos.The shutdown has the astonishing effect of removing a social network used by 170 million people in the US, according to TikToks own numbers. While other social media platforms have experienced outages, even prolonged ones, no network as big as TikTok has simply shut down without any indication of if or when it will come back online.This is despite the Biden administration saying its passing enforcement responsibilitieson to the Trump administrationand calling TikToks threat to go offlinea stunt. TikTok has insisted that without clearer assurances, it has to close up shop in the US. Inside TikTok, an email to employees said that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office on January 20th and that teams are working tirelessly to bring our app back to the U.S. as soon as possible.A warning message started appearing in TikToks app around 9PM ET on Saturday evening, telling users of the pending shutdown:We regret that a US law banning TikTok will take effect on January 19th and force us to make our services temporarily unavailable. Were working to restore our service in the US as soon as possible, and we appreciate your support. Please stay tuned.The app began blocking users around 10:30PM ET. A message now appears saying the app isnt available right now but that the company expects a resolution under President-elect Trump:Sorry, TikTok isnt available right nowA law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, that means you cant use TikTok for now.We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office. Please stay tuned!Several other apps owned by TikToks parent company, ByteDance, have also been taken offline, including the video editor CapCut and the social platform Lemon8.TikTok now displays a warning when opened and wont allow users to watch videos. Screenshot: The VergeThe ban-or-divest law, which goes into effect on Sunday, effectively bans TikTok unless ByteDance sells much of its stake in the company. But ByteDance has shown little sign of being willing to sell, even as the deadline rapidly approached. Instead, TikTok sued the US over the law, ultimately losing in a Supreme Court case this past week.TikToks new strategy appears to be relentlessly pandering to Trump, who despite initially calling for the TikTok ban has recently indicated that he wants to find a way to keep it around. Earlier today, he floated a 90-day extension of ByteDances deadline to sell.Developing...

Go on, tell us!Nintendo finally lifted the lid on the Switch 2 earlier this week and while most of the discussion is about the new hardware, there has also been plenty of conversation about the new Mario Kart game.Perhaps the biggest talking point at the moment about this new entry is the fact there have been 24 spaces spotted on the starting grid. Now, if you've played Mario Kart over the years, you should already know how the race size has jumped from eight to 12 players, so this seems to be another leap.Read the full article on nintendolife.com

TikTok has gone dark in the U.S., the result of a federal law that bans the popular social media app for millions of Americans at least for now.TikTok users began receiving a message about the ban around 10:30 p.m. Eastern. As of Saturday evening, the app was also no longer available in the Apple app store.Sorry, TikTok isnt available right now, the message reads. A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, that means you cant use TikTok for now.This story is developing

Marvel fans have had to wait a long time for Daredevil: Born Again, but they wont have to wait nearly as long for its second season. Per ComicBook.com, Matt Murdock actor Charlie Cox revealed at this years FAN EXPO San Francisco that he already knows when he will start shooting new episodes of the forthcoming Disney+ series, and its sooner than fans may have expected.Its been so many years since we released any Daredevil content. Im really excited about it, Cox said. By the time we release [Born Again] on March 4, well already be shooting season 2. So its just a gift that keeps on giving, really. The actors comment comes less than a week after Marvel unveiled the first official trailer for Daredevil: Born Again.Recommended VideosCoxs announcement is not only a surprise, but also as an encouraging indicator of Marvels confidence in Daredevil: Born Again. The studios production schedule suggests that it is happy enough with Daredevil: Born Again to start shooting its second batch of episodes before it has even been able to gauge fans reactions to the shows first season. Thats exciting, especially because of the positive change of pace it represents for a series that has had to take a long, winding road to reach this point.Marvel Television's Daredevil: Born Again | Official Trailer | Disney+When Daredevil: Born Again was originally announced in 2022, it was said to be an 18-episode, loose continuation of Netflixs Daredevil. Filming began nearly a year later in 2023, but production was stopped and delayed by the years WGA and SAG-AFTRA labor strikes. In September 2023, Marvel then decided to overhaul Born Again, replacing its initial writing and directing teams and changing the series tone and structure and strengthening ties to its beloved Netflix predecessor. All of this means that Marvel fans have been waiting nearly three full years for Daredevil: Born Again, and arguably even longer than that, if you count the four years between Daredevils 2018 cancellation on Netflix and its successors original 2022 announcement.Please enable Javascript to view this contentThe past seven or so years have been long and sometimes rocky for Daredevil fans, but their long wait for Born Again is nearly over. In case that wasnt enough, it doesnt sound like theyll have to worry now about enduring too long of a gap between the series first and second seasons, either.Daredevil: Born Again season 1 premieres March 4 on Disney+.Editors Recommendations

TikTok started going dark for 170 million American users in an unprecedented display of the U.S.-China divide over technology and national security.

TikTok has turned off its app for US users.The move comes after the company lost a legal challenge to a divest-or-ban law in the Supreme Court.The shutdown may not last forever, as TikTok hopes President-elect Donald Trump will step in.TikTok shut down its app for its US users on Saturday, shortly before the January 19 deadline ordering the app to go dark.The stoppage came after the company waged a monthslong legal battle against a law that required its Chinese owner, ByteDance, to divest from its US app or effectively cease operating in the country."Sorry, TikTok isn't available right now," a message popped up on the screen starting around 10:30 p.m. Eastern Time. "A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the US. Unfortunately, that means you can't use TikTok for now. We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office. Please stay tuned!"The final blow for TikTok came on Friday when the Supreme Court ruled against the company's legal challenge. President Joe Biden's administration signaled on Friday that it would not enforce the ban. A spokesperson said that given the "sheer fact of timing, this administration recognizes that actions to implement the law simply must fall to the next Administration, which takes office on Monday."Still, a TikTok spokesperson said the same day it would need to go dark unless the Biden administration stepped in and offered assurances to its "most critical service providers" that the law would not be enforced.The White House said Saturday that TikTok's threat to go dark was a "stunt."While TikTok has shut its doors to its 170 million US users, the app will continue to operate elsewhere. The company said in 2021 that it had over 1 billion users globally.Shortly after the Supreme Court ruling, the app's creators and users took to TikTok to mourn the loss and reflect on the end of an era."Losing the majority of my audience is a difficult reality to face, and while I'm doing everything I can to prepare, it's hard not to feel like I'm starting over," Sofia Bella, a TikTok creator with 4.8 million followers, told Business Insider.TikTok's creators and business partners have had weeks to contemplate the prospect of a January 19 app shutdown. Many have crafted plans for transitioning off TikTok if the app disappeared forever, beginning with downloading all their videos.Some influencer marketers put contingency plans in place to assure brands that creators would post sponsored content on other apps like Instagram if TikTok goes dark. TikTok Shop merchants and their partners began easing off the app in recent days, with some halting US warehouse shipments or pausing distributing free samples to TikTok creators. And marketers put together plans to shift spend to other platforms like Facebook, Instagram reels, and YouTube shorts.Yet, even as users have spent daysmemorializing the app, posting nostalgic video round-ups, and begging fans to follow them on other platforms, it seems possible that TikTok could rise again.While TikTok lost all of its legal challenges to the divest-or-ban law, it's now hoping that President-elect Donald Trump can find a political solution to keep its app around.Trump told NBC on Saturday that he would "most likely" grant TikTok a 90-day extension to find a non-Chinese buyer for the platform."I think that would be, certainly, an option that we look at. The 90-day extension is something that will be most likely done, because it's appropriate. You know, it's appropriate. We have to look at it carefully. It's a very big situation," Trump said, according to the outlet."If I decide to do that, I'll probably announce it on Monday," he added.TikTok's CEO Shou Chew thanked the incoming president in a video on Friday for the "opportunity to work with us to find a solution that keeps TikTok available in the United States."Trump's options to rescue TikTok from the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act are limited, legal experts previously told Business Insider. The simplest option may be to help try to split off TikTok's US entity from the rest of the world, something TikTok's lawyer, Noel Francisco, told the Supreme Court would be "extraordinarily difficult" over any timeline.Trump wrote in a social media post on Friday that he would make a decision on the app soon after reviewing the situation.

Lucky Cookies Bakery / Studio NORSave this picture! Songkai LiuRetail, Retail InteriorsBeijing, ChinaArchitects: Studio NORAreaArea of this architecture projectArea:37 mYearCompletion year of this architecture project Year: 2022 PhotographsPhotographs:Songkai LiuManufacturersBrands with products used in this architecture project Manufacturers: Tikkurila More SpecsLess SpecsSave this picture!Text description provided by the architects. The Lucky Cookies is a bakery specializes in traditional Chinese pastries. Located on the first floor of the famous Beijing Longfu Building, the site is a north-facing street shop with an area of only 37. While the floor height reaches 5.7m, the main depth of the site is just less than 3m. The site's nearly 1:2 bottom-to-height ratio and its full-height glass curtain wall faade compress the store into a "display window": the entire interior space is visible at a single glance. Save this picture!Save this picture!Since the site's only entrance opens towards the interior corridor of the Longfu Building, and the pastry display and cashier has to be arranged next to this entrance, the main space facing the street therefore could only be occupied by the baking kitchen, which occupies 3/4 area of the entire store as required by the design brief. Thus, the most important street-facing storefront has to display a kitchen scene rather than pastries, and the already shallow depth of the store will appear to be even more cramped when filled with kitchen equipment, making it challenging to spatially attract pedestrians to enter the bakery.Save this picture!Save this picture!In response to the above limitations, we decided to use both the interior corridor seating area and exterior seating area offered by the landlord to find a solution. By visually connecting the two seating spaces with the store interior, the sense of spatial scale is expanded and the site's actual climate border is weakened. We also took advantage of the "display window" character of the site to design a presentable baking kitchen, turning a usually back-of-house space into the very shopfront to "live broadcast" the pastry-making process to the street.Save this picture!Save this picture!We raised the interior finished floor to be a 150mm tall travertine platform, which extends to cover the interior corridor seating area. As the original curtain wall faade cannot be modified, we simply added to the exterior seating area a travertine platform whose finished level is at the same height of the interior platform, concealing the bottom frame of the curtain wall underneath, and wrapped the rest of the curtain wall frame with stainless-steel mirror to minimize the presence of the "display window" boundary, making the interior floor appear to extend directly to the outdoors.Save this picture!Save this picture!To further enhance the merging effect of the interior and exterior, we designed a series of isomorphic furniture the "rocks" - to facilitate all functions needed in the bakery - equipment sheds, prep tables, cashier counter, display case, bench, lightbox sign, bamboo pond, etc. Scattered around the bakery like "rocks" growing from the platform, they blur the boundary of the site with their identical material and similar form, creating rich layers within the limited depth, and allowing the interior space to overflow to the exterior. Thus, the large kitchen equipment that fills the site depth all the way to the facade no longer appear crowded.Save this picture!Save this picture!We made full use of the zigzag wall that occupies the largest visual area of the "display window" and designed a 15-meter-long "light screen" to fully catch pedestrians' attention. Specially invented for this project, the 243 prefabricated modular lightboxes on the "screen" are detachable, embedded in the stainless-steel grid by magnetic connections for future easy replacement and maintenance. The front of each lightbox is an inwardly inclined surface to leave space for a little bracket displaying the "paper-cut pastries" at the bottom of each grid. The paper-cuts are made according to the silhouettes of actual pastries sold by the bakery. While the "rocks" horizontally break the site's boundary, the "light screen" vertically utilizes the site's height advantage and north-facing character, counteracts the reflection on the facade glass, and highlights the spatial layers of the "rocks" as a background further connecting the interior space to the outside.Save this picture!Project gallerySee allShow lessProject locationAddress:Langyuan Station, BeijingChinaLocation to be used only as a reference. It could indicate city/country but not exact address.About this officePublished on January 19, 2025Cite: "Lucky Cookies Bakery / Studio NOR" 18 Jan 2025. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/1025408/lucky-cookies-bakery-studio-nor&gt ISSN 0719-8884Save!ArchDaily?You've started following your first account!Did you know?You'll now receive updates based on what you follow! Personalize your stream and start following your favorite authors, offices and users.Go to my stream