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Comment by Gigachad

5 days ago

The vast majority of the population supports banning social media for kids so revolution isn't happening. Of course the social media companies object to their product being banned. It's like cigarette companies objecting to plain packaging.

13 comments

Gigachad

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protocolture  5 days ago

>The vast majority of the population supports banning social media for kids so revolution isn't happening

Age assurance is being used in more than a single scope. I dont disagree that the revolution isnt happening, but theres no need to be so reductive.

>Of course the social media companies object to their product being banned. It's like cigarette companies objecting to plain packaging.

They aren't objecting to age assurance tools. They are objecting to the current ham fisted model, but when they can organise something less nebulous than the current regime they will be fighting to implement it first.

  • Gigachad  5 days ago

    Sure, the implementation details are blunt. But Facebook, Google, and Reddit have had decades to sort this out on their own and yet they have only poured fuel on the problem and watched the ad dollars rain in.

    So I have little sympathy that the resulting laws are not optimal for them.

    • protocolture  5 days ago

      >But Facebook, Google, and Reddit have had decades to sort this out on their own

      It was solved. Dont collect information.

      The problem is making shitty psychotic apps, not determining who can use them.

      I would much rather they cut meta into pieces and sold them off as scraps, than just scarfing up the PID of the users to make arbitrary determinations about who can have what brainrot.

      2 replies →

vlian2088  5 days ago

>The vast majority of the population supports banning social media for kids so revolution isn't happening.

reddit isn't the vast majority of the population, fren. it's 1% of 4%.

unless you've got polls you could show to back up your claim? polls, not opinion pieces. polls asking unambiguous questions like "are you in favor of banning social media?" or "are you in favor of age verification laws?", not vague ones like "are you concerned about the content your kids might see on the internet?". got any of those?

  • Gigachad  5 days ago

    77% of the Australian population were in support of "Proposed ban on social media for children under 16"

    https://yougov.com/articles/51000-support-for-under-16-socia...

    This was in 2024, since then the attitude is still very much that kids should be taken off social media, but that the current restrictions aren't yet working as the face scanning verification is easily bypassed.

    • protocolture  4 days ago

      Australia is notoriously hard to poll.

      Look at the 2023 referendum.

      When something is fed to us by the media, and supported by both ALP and LNP there's rarely ever public dissent. The risks of age assurance weren't given any public airtime. The few criticisms that were put to the government were shrugged off as "oh it might start working later".

      Probably a comparable issue would be the MyHealth Record nonsense, where the existence of the platform was largely uncontentious, but the change to make it opt-out rather than opt-in was actually put to public debate and once some day light got in, a significant amount of people opted out.

    • vlian2088  5 days ago

      well, shit. Australians absolutely deserve having to scan their faces/fingers/eyeballs/assholes every time they touch their phones, then.

  • intended  5 days ago

    > 6 in 10 parents worldwide support social media ban for under 16s - but children are divided

    > Support among parents for a social media ban for under-16s is highest in Malaysia (77%) and India (75%), Argentina (55%) and lowest in Japan (38%) and Nigeria (39%)

    > Globally, the majority of Gen Z (51%) – the first true digital natives – support a social media ban for under-16s. Support for the ban is highest in India (73%) and UAE (67%), Argentina (54%) and lowest in Japan (28%), UK, and Canada (both 40%

    https://www.varkeyfoundation.org/post/6-in-10-parents-worldw... Support among parents for a social media ban for under-16s is highest in Malaysia (77%) and India (75%), Argentina (55%) and lowest in Japan (38%) and Nigeria (39%)