This week’s TikTok news came with a strong feeling of déjà vu. Now, with the Biden administration giving up to a year for the app to be spun off from ByteDance or face a ban from the US, the question is: what happens next? 

ByteDance has been clear that it will fight this new law in the courts on First Amendment grounds, which is how it successfully defeated the Trump administration’s 2020 ban attempt. After talking to sources in and around the company, I think spinning off TikTok is the last-resort measure for leadership. CEO Shou Chew and other execs encouraged staff to stay the course during a humdrum all-hands meeting at TikTok’s New York City headquarters earlier this week, according to two people in attendance. 

For the most part, my sources tell me that it’s business as usual internally, especially for those who were around for the last ban attempt. Uncertainty is nothing new if you work at TikTok, and there’s some hope that this new law will, if anything, finally bring much-needed clarity to the app’s fate.