Other companies are also in talks, but Microsoft is the furthest along/having the best chance.

More to the point, Microsoft is the company least involved in social media that has the largest warchest. No way Congress or the administration would condone any of the companies whose CEOs testified on Capitol Hill this week buying TikTok.

Technically Microsoft owned 1.6% shares before Facebook's IPO, and last information I could get it had sold 20% of the proceeds post-IPO in 2012, so they are somewhat involved in social media.

[1] https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-offloads-20-percent-...

Yeah, you're right. That investment means they are somewhat involved in social media.

At 1% (minus 20% of that too) it's basically meaningless

Whether you want to dance (TikTok) or code (github), we got you covered.

> Whether you want to dance (TikTok) or code (github),

Or work (LinkedIn)

Or talk (Skype)

> More to the point, Microsoft is the company least involved in social media that has the largest warchest

Probably not, no matter how you prioritize the two prongs of that, and no matter which construction of war chest size you take, since Alphabet and Apple both less social media involvement (though Alphabet has tried in the past to have more) and more cash on hand, while both Apple and Amazon have less social media involvement and greater market cap.

Apple just don't do those things. It will be extremely unusual.

Don't forget YouTube, which is also "social media".

Amazon and Apple don't really have a social media presence either.

Amazon has Twitch

Almost every kid at my daughter's elementary school has TikTok installed and they are all under 13. If you have an Android phone, they do basically no verification to register and then if you go to your Google Account you can see that they share your email and personal data with TikTok. This is a major COPPA violation. Does this mean Microsoft may soon be the biggest violator of COPPA in the US?

The FTC's guidance specifically allows services to rely on a user's self-reported age. See https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/com..., under the heading "Will the COPPA Rule prevent children from lying about their age to register for general audience sites or online services whose terms of service prohibit their participation?"

didn't you use the internet way before you were 13? it boggles my mind why people care about this

Anyone over 35 most likely didn't use the internet before they were 13. I know, hard to believe that people are older than the internet.

I'm 50, and there were no commercial ISPs before I first got Internet access (also BITNET) at my university.

Every company does this. Discord, Twitter, Instagram all have scores of children under 13 on their platforms.

As long as they did reasonable CYA then they cannot really be held accountable.

To be clear, I think you mean "email address" when you say that TikTok has access to "email". They don't actually have access to email, and I know the distinction is well understood here but it seems most of the United States is being lead to believe that TikTok can read the contents of GMail because of some sneaky Terms of Use agreement.

> basically no verification

That's what the law is. See item 12 here: https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/com...

Google accounts set up with "Family Link" (for users under 13 year old) can't use the "Sign In with Google" feature, so it's safe to assume/hide behind "Google did age verification".

In practice, can't that easily be resolved by prompting each user to verify they are at least 13 years old, enter their age, or enter their birthday?

Enter their birthday. My son and his friends and cousins always enter the year of their birthday as 1955 so that they appear to be old men when they were under 13. They never answer honestly and it is like having a fake ID.

Microsoft used to have a Passport service that could verify a user, just add in an ID to verify age scan your driver's license or whatever and send it to Microsoft passport. It is an extra step but you don't want the kiddies looking at nudes and violence and hate speech.