The Case for a Post-TikTok Future: Frank McCourt’s Bid to Buy Project Liberty and the Social Network Protocol

The court’s decision leaves TikTok with few avenues for survival. Donald Trump promised on the campaign trail to save the platform, and one possibility is that he will do so come January. But beyond winning a final legal appeal at the Supreme Court, which is far from guaranteed, finding a wealthy buyer in the US may be TikTok’s most viable option.

Frank McCourt was in this newsletter and spoke about his bid to buy TikTok. After last week’s events, I figured it was a good time to check back in with him. Plus, I got some insight on how creators are preparing for a post-TikTok future.

In our conversation, McCourt said a sale would make everyone happy and include the US government. McCourt has offered $20 billion for the app’s brand, its user base, and the existing content in order to scale his vision of an interoperable, more privacy-friendly internet that competes with companies like Meta and Google. He doesn’t want or need the program that runs on TikTok’s For You page.

When asked if Project Liberty could maintain TikTok’s existing userbase without the beloved algorithm, McCourt said, “People don’t know what they don’t have until you show them.”

WIRED spoke with McCourt earlier this week about what else he would do with the app, including keeping some form of advertising (“People, in America in particular, like to buy things,” he says) and letting people curate their own recommendation algorithm (“It’s a much better model”).

Frank McCourt, former owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers and real estate mogul, said he has received $20 billion in informal pledges from investors to purchase the app as part of a people’s bid. The sale would bolster McCourt’s existing technology initiative Project Liberty and the so-called decentralized social networking protocol it has developed. The DSNP is being incorporated into TikTok and will allow users to export friends from other apps.