Thread by @_DanielSinclair

TikTok was smart to hit the ground running with some of this functionality:

While the mobile web app is better than most, it would still be limited by the CDN. The experience wouldn't be as great as you see right now, even if ByteDance built out Canadian infrastructure.

The big missing piece for the web app experience is creation. TikTok would not be TikTok if users could not as easily create, rehash, and duet. These user experience loops are core to what makes TikTok a success story.

WebKit simply cannot do what apps like TikTok can do natively. That means filters and beyond, even with WebKit's growing support for Augmented Reality. If it came to a TikTok ban, creation would be the bigger hurdle than consumption. It would lose the fun factor.

WeChat may be a different story, given the simpler nature of messaging apps, but this is where WeChat for Web is at on mobile today.

The walled gardens of smartphone operating systems are just not designed for this — on purpose. We will see business circumvention techniques, and users finding ways to make the best of what they have, but it won't be the same.

Apple and Google have the opportunity to respond to these demands by Commerce, like the case of Apple versus the FBI. Apple, fearing retaliation in China, may actually be incentivized to publicly challenge it.

I don't think we'll see Facebook responding to this one, though. TikTok reaching out to Tim Cook would have been a better bet.

Apple could very well accept the hit, remain neutral, and remove the app from sale. But what will be interesting is how they enforce these rules: will Apple allow third party TikTok and WeChat clients on their App Store?

Could TikTok and WeChat open up their protocols to allow a 3rd party ecosystem, similar to how Twitter clients work? Reverse engineering and utilizing these APIs is possible today, with limitations. But these companies could embrace them too, challenging bans alongside Americans.