Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Emily Baker-White

@ebakerwhite.bsky.social

22K followers 1.1K following 880 posts

Investigative reporter @ Forbes, fmr BuzzFeed News. Author: Every Screen On The Planet: The War Over TikTok. Tip me here! [email protected] Prev. content policy @ Facebook, Spotify. Founder, Plain View Project. HLS c/o 2015.

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · Feb 3

I’ve spent the past year+ working on a book about TikTok. It’s out in September. Pre-order now!!

www.everyscreenontheplanet.com

1 18 54

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 1d

I’m betting this is just an enforcement error.

But also: TikTok is only online today because Trump has ordered his DOJ to not enforce the law banning it, so the company certainly has an incentive not to cross him.

Prem Thakker ツ @premthakker.bsky.social · 1d

Huh: TikTok took down my 8-second video featuring this image of Debbie Brockman — the news producer just detained by Trump’s CBP agents — saying it violates the “joy of TikTok”

2 9 29

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

Prem Thakker ツ @premthakker.bsky.social · 1d

Huh: TikTok took down my 8-second video featuring this image of Debbie Brockman — the news producer just detained by Trump’s CBP agents — saying it violates the “joy of TikTok”

310 2.6K 7.1K

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 2d

This is such a weird framing — nobody “loses” the Nobel Peace Prize!

It’s not like he was in the postseason for Nobels or something; he “lost” only as much as, like, your mom did.

5 8 28

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

Nate Schenkkan @nateschenkkan.bsky.social · 4d

New from me in @foreignpolicy.com: how the US has gone from leading a global push against transnational repression, to proactively supporting it:

foreignpolicy.com/2025/10/08/t...

Trump Is Supporting Transnational Repression

Instead of sheltering pro-democracy dissidents, America is now returning them for arrest.

foreignpolicy.com

1 37 67

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

Commonwealth Club World Affairs @cwclub.bsky.social · 7d

Where else can you see Tim Berners-Lee, @brewster.kahle.org @maryroach.bsky.social @ebakerwhite.bsky.social @mikeisaac.bsky.social Shaka Senghor, Steven Pinker and many others this week?

Details & tickets: commonwealthclub.org/events

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

Zach Everson @zacheverson.com · 10d

New: Abu Dhabi fund MGX told me it picked USD1—a Trump family–linked stablecoin from World Liberty Financial—to put $2B into Binance, citing its “compliance history.”

USD1 had just launched.

me, for @forbes.com

🪙🍼🤷

1/

MGX Says $2 Billion Binance Investment Used USD1 Because Of ‘Compliance History’—But The Trump-Linked Stablecoin Was Brand New

The Abu Dhabi fund told Forbes that Binance requested settling with a cryptocurrency and used a stablecoin for stability, ultimately selecting USD1, in part, because it was backed by U.S. government a...

www.forbes.com

16 160 330

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

W. W. Norton & Company @wwnorton.com · 10d

"An in-depth account of the struggle between the U.S. and China to control TikTok.…gripping….comprehensive….Readers will be riveted." ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)

@ebakerwhite.bsky.social is on tour now for EVERY SCREEN ON THE PLANET.
wwnorton.com/books/every-...

2 3

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 11d

come play!!

1 3

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 12d

My TikTok book is out in stores today!

Why should you read it? Because 1 in 5 Americans now get their news from this thing. We should all understand how it works.

It was inevitable that strongmen would seek to control a tool this powerful. The book is the story of what happened when they did.

W. W. Norton & Company @wwnorton.com · Feb 3

The rise of the most effective attention-algorithm ever invented, and the superpower struggle to control it.

EVERY SCREEN ON THE PLANET: THE WAR OVER TIKTOK by Emily Baker-White.

In Stores 9.30.25.
wwnorton.com/books/every-...

1 22 62

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 12d

I generate transcripts rather than watching videos

1 10

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 12d

[closes tab]

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 12d

Refusing to watch a video that could have been an article is, like, my whole personality

Kat Tenbarge @kattenbarge.bsky.social · 13d

The real generational divide is people who refuse to watch a video if it could be an article versus people who refuse to read an article if it could be a video

9 3 59

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 12d

new from me: time is a flat circle

www.forbes.com/sites/emilyb...

Trump’s TikTok Deal Seems Like The One The Biden White House Rejected

Trump appears poised to accept a set of terms similar to Project Texas, a ByteDance proposal that Biden felt perpetuated an unacceptable risk to national security.

www.forbes.com

17 33

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 13d

Concerns about TikTok becoming a partisan MAGA engine are reasonable, but having listened to what Trump actually said here, this headline is misleading and needlessly inflammatory.

Karl Bode @karlbode.com · 13d

TikTok owned by Rupert Murdoch and Larry Ellison is going to be wall to wall Trump and Netanyahu apologia, and ethical people still on there should begin contemplating their exit

Trump says TikTok should be tweaked to become “100% MAGA”

Uncertainty reigns as Trump claims China approved TikTok deal.

arstechnica.com

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 13d

wait whut

1 6

Reposted by Emily Baker-White

Brandon Kennedy @bicycleidiot.bsky.social · 15d

RIP Kaleb Horton
kalebhorton.ghost.io/2025-so-far/

I also have advice. Everybody loves reading advice on the computer, so I'll share it: the best thing you can do right now is log off as hard as you can. Go outside, talk to people in real life where it's actually kind of rude to talk about the news, try to actually see the friends you usually just text message. Go for a long drive and turn the phone off while you do it. Get back into your hobbies or pick one and learn it for a while. Watch one of those studio movies that reviews called "wildly miscalculated" and you haven't seen since high school. Play an album you like but find embarrassing. Go to free community events even if they sound stupid. If you take the freeway, try the surface streets. Go to a bad diner and just order some bad coffee because even bad coffee is good coffee.
You can't help anybody when you're exhausted and keep posting one million college-educated rewordings of "I would love to be dead right now" on the computer. Walk away from the thing and try out some of those normal things you hear about and if you get bored that's wonderful because we're not supposed to get bored anymore. It turns out boredom is the Cadillac of feelings.

39 1.8K 4.9K

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 14d

🫠

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 14d

The proposal is not about section 230, so the above commenter’s concern is not relevant.

1 5

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 14d

It’s not about section 230. It’s about forcing tech companies to be more transparent about their systems.

1 14

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 14d

Related: legislators should make all platforms maintain their own crowdtangles (and ad libraries)!

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/25/o...

Opinion | Legislators Should Force Social Media Platforms to Tell the Truth

www.nytimes.com

5 14 170

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 15d

“ByteDance will be maintaining ownership of TikTok's U.S. business operations and will cede control of the app’s data, content and algorithm to the newly formed joint venture, the sources said.”

www.reuters.com/legal/transa...

1 4

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 15d

tfw your complex rev share agreement is definitely not an “operational relationship”

1 2

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 15d

lol
lmao
sigh

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

ByteDance to Get About 50% of TikTok US Profit Under Trump Deal

TikTok’s Chinese parent company will likely get about half of the profit from the platform’s US operation even after it sells majority ownership to American investors as part of a deal orchestrated by...

www.bloomberg.com

3 2 9

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 16d

Please say more

1 5

Emily Baker-White @ebakerwhite.bsky.social · 16d

Look at them go