The bill works by fining marketplaces that distribute apps right? Is there a reason bytedance couldn’t host tiktok.com outside of the country and have people go there?
Tiktok can still be a website or even a side-loaded app. The reason for this article is that the law's authors bothered to prevent the most obvious legal workarounds (shell companies / subsidiaries). That they didn't bother with other constraints implies they're OK with it.
Of course this doesn't work for the modern crack dealer, but they can sell the business to just about anyone, in any other country. Not much of a ban really, if free speech was really an issue.
I think the idea is that if Apple and Google cant/wont host TikTok then it functionally is banned for most users. I'd guess a massive percentage of tiktok usage is directly on their app, not their website.
