I saw this article, which made me think about it…

Kids under 16 to be banned from social media after Senate passes world-first laws


Seeing what kind of brainrot kids are watching, makes me think it’s a good idea. I wouldn’t say all content is bad, but most kids will get hooked on trash content that is intentionally designed to grab their attention.

What would be an effective way to enforce a restriction with the fewest possible side effects? And who should be the one enforcing that restriction in your opinion?

  • Dorkyd68@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    Yes it’s a cancerous plague on society. It creates a false sense on identity and want. Young peoples minds are constantly bombarded by people telling them how they should think, feel and look

    Australia did it somewhat right by banning minors until they are 16. However I feel this may create a stronger desire for some to join much like teens drinking and smoking bud cause it’s forbidden. At 16 you’ll only create a stronger desire to join. As such I feel like it should be pushed back to 20, you’re no longer a teen and as a young adult the temptation to join and let your mind be swayed by bull shit may be less prevalent

  • beliquititious@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    7 days ago

    In real terms, I have no idea if this is a good move or a bad one. We’ll know more in five years once the Aussie nerds can publish on the effects. I can’t think of a compelling reason not to try it though.

    Social media use is bad for everyone. Tech companies have spent billions of dollars refining and optimizing their platforms to maximize engagement and usage at the expense of all other considerations.

    I’ve been researching the mental health effects of social media for an unrelated project I am working on. From an incomplete read of the research, social media use has a strong correlation with mental health issues. I haven’t encountered anything peer reviewed that proposes a specific relationship between the two, but my personal (somewhat well informed) guess is that someone will find a link eventually. That’s just where the research I’ve read seems to be headed.

    I’d guess they probably have a symbiotic relationship. (Certain kinds of) Mentally ill folks use social media more than others, why or if that is anything more than a red herring is still to be determined, but I have read coverage of other research that suggests that social media might be destroying attention spans (though I haven’t read that research myself yet).

    Getting the political system involved in this effort is probably undesirable simply because elected officials seem to have entirely abandoned any pretense of using science to inform policy and are basically puppets for the oligarchy. Voting against the interests of their donors is unlikely.

    • orcrist@lemm.ee
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      7 days ago

      I don’t understand. Are you honestly claiming that you don’t see any possible value in social media for teenagers? We could talk about people with eating disorders. We could talk about marginalized minorities who can find support in distant communities because where they live is ultra-conservative. We don’t have to work hard to think of those examples, they’re well documented, they’re very real.

      Of course you could argue that the harms outweigh the benefits, but to pretend that there are no benefits is just mind boggling.

      • beliquititious@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        7 days ago

        What I’m saying is that we don’t know the full scope of how social media affects developing minds. The harm might outweigh the benefits or not, we just don’t know yet. I will be very interested to see the academic research on the effects the ban in Australia has on Australian children.

        Social media has benefits for adults and children, but the ways in which these platforms influence thought and behavior creates significant problems. As an example consider Elon Musk’s purchase of twitter and the subsequent effects it had on the American election and culture. On the one hand that is the reality we all live in and learning to adapt and compensate is a critical skill to teach our children, on the other there is no reason that things must be the way they are now.

        If I could speak to a policy maker I would encourage them not to ban social media use for kids, for no other reason than bans (usually) don’t work to address the problem they set out to solve and are easily circumvented online by motivated individuals. If lawmakers were interested in addressing the safety of children online, regulating social platforms would be a better starting point. Unfortunately though, tech companies have a lot more money to lobby against those kinds of initiatives than teenagers and the adults interested in protecting them.

        Platforms could address the issues that lead to harm and create a beneficial tool for it’s users, however there is little incentive for them to do so because the current system exists as the result of their efforts to maximize profit and furthers other agendas. (I don’t mean that in a cynical anti-capitalist way, just that it is the nature of the way social media companies are structured and funded.) The research suggests that we might need to reevaluate how we integrate social media into our lives and build these platforms.

        If nothing else barring children from using social media will present us an opportunity to get a better understanding of how social media effects them.

  • IninewCrow@lemmy.ca
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    8 days ago

    There is no real need to regulate kids on devices … leave that up to the parents to figure out.

    What we need is to regulate every major corporately owned social media company. Regulate and control them like they do for newspapers, magazines or television. Put them under complete regulatory control across the board so that we can regain some normalcy in public perception of reality and politics everywhere.

    It’s a pipe dream I know … but in the meantime, no matter what anyone says or does … if social media companies are not regulated, everything and everyone is going to hell in a hand basket.

  • Dave@lemmy.nz
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    8 days ago

    I can’t remember which article I was reading, probably one on Lemmy, but it said that we know social media algorithms are bad for people and their mental and physical health, that they are divisive, drive extremism, and just in general are not safe for society.

    Drugs are regulated to ensure they are safe, so why aren’t social media algorithms regulated the same way? Politicians not understanding the technical details of algorithms is not an excuse - politicians also don’t understand the technical details of drugs, so they have a process involving experts that ensures they are safe.

    I think I’m on the side of that article. Social media algorithms are demonstrably unsafe in a range of ways, and it’s not just for under 16s. So I think we should be regulating the algorithms, requiring companies wishing to use them to prove they are safe before they do so. You could pre-approve certain basic ones (rank by date, rank by upvotes minus downvotes with time decay like lemmy, etc). You could issue patents to them like we do with drugs. But all in all, I think I am on the side of fixing the problem rather than pretending to care in the name of saving the kids.

    • orcrist@lemm.ee
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      7 days ago

      I recall that some years ago Facebook was looking into their algorithm and they found that it was potentially leading to overuse, which might be what you’re thinking of, but what actually happened is that they changed it so that people wouldn’t be using Facebook as much. Of course people who are opposed to social media ignored the second half of the above statement.

      Anyway, when you say the algorithms are demonstrably unsafe, you know you’re wrong because you didn’t demonstrate anything, and you didn’t cite anyone demonstrating anything. You can say you think they’re unsafe, but that’s a matter of opinion and we all have our own opinions.

      • Dave@lemmy.nz
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        7 days ago

        I recall that some years ago Facebook was looking into their algorithm and they found that it was potentially leading to overuse, which might be what you’re thinking of,

        No, it was recent, and it was an opinion style piece not news.

        but what actually happened is that they changed it so that people wouldn’t be using Facebook as much.

        Can you back this up? Were they forced to by a court, or was this before the IPO when facebook was trying to gain ground and didn’t answer to the share market? I can’t imagine they would be allowed to take actions that reduce profits, companies are legally required to maximise value to shareholders.

        Anyway, when you say the algorithms are demonstrably unsafe, you know you’re wrong because you didn’t demonstrate anything, and you didn’t cite anyone demonstrating anything. You can say you think they’re unsafe, but that’s a matter of opinion and we all have our own opinions.

        I mean it doesn’t take long to find studies like A nationwide study on time spent on social media and self-harm among adolescents or Does mindless scrolling hamper well-being? or How Algorithms Promote Self-Radicalization but I think this misses the point.

        You’ve grabbed the part where I made a throwaway comment but missed the point of my post. Facebook is one type of social media, and they use a specific algorithm. Ibuprofen is a specific type of drug. Sometimes ibuprofen can be used in a way that is harmful, but largely it is considered safe. But the producers still had to prove it was safe.

        • orcrist@lemm.ee
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          7 days ago

          Here’s one example of Facebook adjusting its algorithm several years ago. You can remark that it ought to do more, and I may agree with you, but that’s totally different from saying it doesn’t do anything positive. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2021/how-facebook-algorithm-works/

          If your argument is that there can be drawbacks to using social media, I think everyone agrees. But remember, we were told horror stories about pinball, pool, comic books, chewing gum, Dungeons and Dragons, the list goes on and on. So with that in mind, I hope you can understand why I’m not convinced by a few studies that social media is net negative in value.

          And the reason we have laws requiring careful drug testing is because of damage that was done in the past, proven damage that actually happened, people whose lives ended short because they were doing things like imbibing radioactive chemicals. Your suggestion that we ought to treat social media the same is putting the cart before the horse. The burden of proof is on you, not on social media companies.

          • Dave@lemmy.nz
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            6 days ago

            I think we ultimately have different beliefs about how things should work. I think companies should prove their products are safe, you think things should be allowed unless you can prove it’s not safe.

            I get it, and I think it’s OK to have different opinions on this.

  • freethemedia@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    8 days ago

    Controversial opinion:

    In the future we are going to look back on seeing children use iPads that directly connect them to the most sophisticated engagement and manipulation algorithms ever as something as horrid as a child smoking a cigarette, or doing any other drug

    Now obviously this is an issue, but many of the suggested solutions are lacking.

    Remember: the phones in our pocket are turing complete, any software solution can be undone by another software solution

    Hardware flaws baked into chipsets will be inevitably exploited by the worst of humanity

    What we need is a LEGAL framework to this issue

    We need to see that allowing a full 5g 2.5ghZ portal to the unknown is simply absolutely harmful for a child to get there hands on without parental or educational supervision

    I suspect it really should work like regulating a drug, allow more and more unsupervised compute and networking as the child ages

    That way kids can still have dumb phones for basic safety and comms.

    I suspect laws will be applied like alcohol within the home, to allow for family owned game systems and such

    But lapses that lead to actual demonstrated harm such as mental illness leading to bodily harm or violence due to radicalization need to be treated as if a parent just fed their child alcohol without care. Or at least enabled them to it if it’s evident that they didn’t even try

    Straight up it’s also a cultural shift 13-16 yr olds gaming at home under parental guidance, but not being bought significant personal compute since it would not be sold to them or for the purpose of giving to them

    Usage in school where they get education on information technology and the harms and good it can do all fine and good , but seeing babies with iPads at the mall seen as badly as letting them smoke (and the secondhand smoke from all the brainrot leading to brainrotted adult)

    • freethemedia@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      8 days ago

      I really am curious if anyone could demonstrate a link to the amount of access to compute and network bandwidth as a child ages, and the incidence of anxiety, social, or mood disorders.

      One of the things I feel really thankful for is that the available compute and network I had access to grew up with me essentially, allowing me to generally see the harms of full scale manipulating social algorithms and avoid them.

      I feel like my mental health has been greatly benefitted by staying away from such platforms.

      • freethemedia@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        8 days ago

        This isn’t even like a social media only thing. There’s so many worse things a kid could get their eyes and ears on with the compute we just hand them Willy nilly

    • otp@sh.itjust.works
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      8 days ago

      In the future we are going to look back on seeing children use iPads that directly connect them to the most sophisticated engagement and manipulation algorithms ever as something as horrid as a child smoking a cigarette, or doing any other drug

      Are we looking at video games this way now?

      • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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        8 days ago

        Depends on the game. Some of them, absolutely. Roblox is one that comes to mind, probably Fortnite as well. And one shouldn’t even start on mobile games.

  • The summer blues...@sh.itjust.works
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    8 days ago

    I think kids using regular social media is a result of there being no more sites for kids.

    When I was a terminally online unloved kid told to go away whenever I breathed in my family’s presence, I wasn’t browsing Facebook and Twitter. I was playing on KOL, GirlSense, Nicktropolis, and games I pirated. I was creative so I also pirated art, movie, and game making software and sunk hours into hobbies. Back on the internet, I’d also play flash games and pirate TV shows and movies.

    The sites we have today are aimed at toddlers. Sites for teens are just gone now. But does it even matter? Teenagers are treated like they’re 18 the minute they’re 13. It’s shameful to like cartoons and videos games at 13. It’s shameful to not have a job and live alone at 13. You’re supposed to grind anti aging care, have a job, speedrun school, have children, have a car, and be rich at that time. Teens bully other teens for being teens. Society is ruined beyond repair. Banning children from using the internet will only breed more tech savvy minors who will still use the internet. It’s way too late.

  • Lvxferre@mander.xyz
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    8 days ago

    I don’t think that kids should be banned from social media. Instead they should be taught how to handle it in an individually and socially healthy way. Namely:

    • how to spot misinformation
    • how to spot manipulation
    • how to protect yourself online
    • how to engage constructively with other people
    • etc.

    This could be taught by parents, school, or even their own peers. But I think that all three should play a role.

    • Surp@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      That’s something most children can’t understand it’s basically adding up to an entire multi years school course what you’re proposing and the way the education system is going in many countries id say good luck. It’s not like as easy as saying oh little Charlie that’s fake info because you should read xyZ scientific papers on climate change. Kids are fucking stupid even while going to school. People are constantly coming up with new ways to trick people and kids are above all the easiest to trick.

      • Lvxferre@mander.xyz
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        7 days ago

        That’s something most children can’t understand

        We’re talking about children and teens. A 6yo eating bullshit is natural; a 13yo doing it should not. Please don’t be disingenuous, stop oversimplifying = distorting things.

        it’s basically adding up to an entire multi years school course what you’re proposing

        Full stop here. That is not even remotely close to what I said, stop lying.

        I’m not going to waste my time further with you.

        • Surp@lemmy.world
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          7 days ago

          Teens are also stupid it is easy to simplify you probably don’t have children nor work around them. They dont need social media so early. Spotted the Russian Facebook employee. You’re a waste of everyone’s time.

  • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
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    8 days ago

    Absolutely not. Anything you put in is likely going to have privacy issues for both adults and children, and you forget how smart children are. I know we had firewalls and all kinds of shit when I was in school, and I was the person who taught everybody else how to bypass them in like five minutes. There is not a filter in the world you can put up that are going to keep children from the content that they actually want to look at.

    • Im_old@lemmy.world
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      8 days ago

      Have you ever heard of the great firewall of China? It’s always a budget issue, not a technical issue. We can block what we want with the right resources.

      • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip
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        8 days ago

        I think the better question is who has not heard of the Great Firewall of China, but it can still be bypassed. In fact, I’ve even spoken on a podcast with somebody from China by passing the firewall while we were talking.

  • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    8 days ago

    The biggest reason why not is that it requires the implementation of centralized tracking systems for everyone to confirm ID for accessing these services, which is a privacy nightmare and takes way too much agency away from individuals. If Reddit or something bans me for a stupid reason or because their broad brush modbots malfunctioned, I should be able to evade that ban with enough care and effort, and the government shouldn’t help them make sure I can’t. I should also have the ability to use social media pseudonymously without being subject to corporate tracking.

    The other reason, of course, is that banning children from social media cuts them off from participating in society or having any sort of a public voice. That’s fucked up too.

  • stinky@redlemmy.com
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    8 days ago

    Me: there should be an agency like the FDA that brands news and other media with veracity labels according to guidelines we as voters agree on to prevent fake news and misinformation

    Them: YOU CAN’T BECAUSE OF FREE SPEECH DIE HEATHEN DIE

    Me: ok what about banning kids from social media?

    Them: that’s fine :)

    Hypocrites.