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Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

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Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#191

Post by 0xParlay »

HDThoreaun wrote: post #156
0xParlay wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean FB engineers are specifically optimizing for toxicity at an algorithmic level. It’s the product. You can’t perform controlled experiments to measure the profitability of depression and also fiend ignorance. You’re all very welcome to whatabout but working at FB is a stain on your character.

I mean no, they're specifically optimizing for engagement. It just turns out that toxicity fuels engagement.

Non sequitor. They're optimizing for money. Contrarian status: weak.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#193

Post by CodeSgt »

dfxm12 wrote: post #178
yodsanklai wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not being able to scale is YOUR problem, not MINE. Following your reasoning, anything that could possibly harm children should be banned. Cars sometimes kill children, shall we ban them too? Now, suppose we do ban Meta. Where should we stop? should we ban open decentralized social media too? You may not like social media, but a lot of people use them without any particular issues.

I think the lawsuit in the article draws a reasonable, if not conservative, line at knowingly exploiting vulnerable people to boost profits, which a whistleblower is saying Meta is doing. It's not just that the product is harming people, but that it is going out of its way to harm people. Is open decentralized social media doing this? There are restrictions around advertising for cigarettes, I think for the same reas…

> knowingly > exploitable > vulnerable

None of these are cut and dry. How vulnerable does someone have to be before you can exploit them? How harmful does the behavior have to be before it’s exploitation? What is “knowingly” in an organization? How should events be handled if it’s a single engineer operating in the shadows vs a board decision? etc etc etc

The answers to these question may seem obvious to you, and someone else nay have a completely different answer that seems equally obvious to them.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#194

Post by yodsanklai »

rangerelf wrote: post #186
yodsanklai wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not being able to scale is YOUR problem, not MINE. Following your reasoning, anything that could possibly harm children should be banned. Cars sometimes kill children, shall we ban them too? Now, suppose we do ban Meta. Where should we stop? should we ban open decentralized social media too? You may not like social media, but a lot of people use them without any particular issues.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE explain how that's in any remote way equivalent?? "hurr durr lets ban cars now". PLEASE. Unlike social media, to drive a car you need a license, you need insurance, and if you run over a kid you most likely will go to prison. Or maybe you weren't driving your car, but it was unsecured, or had a mechanical malfunction. You are still responsible and you will in one way or another have to pay. But,…

> PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE explain how that's in any remote way equivalent??

let's ban meta because they can't prevent that some kid somewhere is gonna be able to create an account (and may see really horrible things there)

let's ban car because some kids are going to get run over because car manufacturers can't prevent it.

You're welcome

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#195

Post by [deleted] »

yodsanklai wrote: post #155
glimshe wrote: post #129

Irrespective of the incidental value "Meta" provides, let's keep in mind that no business has a right to exist independently from its standing in the system of laws and the health of its users - especially children. Social media companies argue that they can't monitor every post and do appropriate age verification online because it would be "impossible to scale". Well, tough luck. Not being able to scale is YOUR prob…

> Not being able to scale is YOUR problem, not MINE. Following your reasoning, anything that could possibly harm children should be banned. Cars sometimes kill children, shall we ban them too? Now, suppose we do ban Meta. Where should we stop? should we ban open decentralized social media too? You may not like social media, but a lot of people use them without any particular issues.

[deleted]

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#196

Post by xboxnolifes »

yodsanklai wrote: post #155
glimshe wrote: post #129

Irrespective of the incidental value "Meta" provides, let's keep in mind that no business has a right to exist independently from its standing in the system of laws and the health of its users - especially children. Social media companies argue that they can't monitor every post and do appropriate age verification online because it would be "impossible to scale". Well, tough luck. Not being able to scale is YOUR prob…

> Not being able to scale is YOUR problem, not MINE. Following your reasoning, anything that could possibly harm children should be banned. Cars sometimes kill children, shall we ban them too? Now, suppose we do ban Meta. Where should we stop? should we ban open decentralized social media too? You may not like social media, but a lot of people use them without any particular issues.

We do ban cars. We have safety ratings and regulations that they have to meet, otherwise they are banned from sales. We also have driving tests and age requirements for using them.

Since we still have cars post regulation, maybe we would still have social media as well.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#197

Post by cheriot »

yieldcrv wrote: post #189
cheriot wrote: post #176

> with features like “infinite scroll” and persistent alerts used to hook young users > Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies Are we talking about infinite scroll or heroine? It would make more sense to sue Kelloggs over Lucky Charms commercials, but we're all use to them so there's no outrage. It's politically popular to sue big tech and especially Meta. That's the whole story. To be clear, the…

we’re talking about dopamine production and that’s always what we wind up regulating so, good observation. regulate aspects of these products like heroin

I look forward to the absurd user interface rules that get proposed or even enshrined in federal regulation. It's an impossible task.

Alternate path: attach electrodes to kids, measure dopamine levels, and turn off the app if they go too high.

Simpler, but less fun: set the max time an app can be open.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#198

Post by isk517 »

cj wrote: post #33
pixl97 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How often again do you hear billionaires say "Oh no, I wish I had been more ethical and not made mountains of cash off by shitty behavior", because I'm not having any recollections of this. The fines are just a cost of doing business for them.

I agree the US is soft on punishing white-collar crime. But Sackler family comes to mind. And of course there's Sam Bankman-Fried. Bernie Madoff, etc.

Bernie Madoff and Sam Bankman-Fried both made the mistake of messing with the money of other rich people.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#199

Post by Spivak »

yieldcrv wrote: post #189
cheriot wrote: post #176

> with features like “infinite scroll” and persistent alerts used to hook young users > Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies Are we talking about infinite scroll or heroine? It would make more sense to sue Kelloggs over Lucky Charms commercials, but we're all use to them so there's no outrage. It's politically popular to sue big tech and especially Meta. That's the whole story. To be clear, the…

we’re talking about dopamine production and that’s always what we wind up regulating so, good observation. regulate aspects of these products like heroin

This has reached absurdity, everything we do releases dopamine. You would ban all activities humans do for pleasure.

If you want the make the case that IG is unhealthy you need to argue along a different axis because the problem with IG and heroine isn't that it makes dopamine.

Re: Meta sued by states over harmful youth marketing

#200

Post by cheriot »

swatcoder wrote: post #184
cheriot wrote: post #176

> with features like “infinite scroll” and persistent alerts used to hook young users > Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies Are we talking about infinite scroll or heroine? It would make more sense to sue Kelloggs over Lucky Charms commercials, but we're all use to them so there's no outrage. It's politically popular to sue big tech and especially Meta. That's the whole story. To be clear, the…

> It would make more sense to sue Kelloggs over Lucky Charms commercials, but we're all use to them so there's no outrage. Of all the examples you might offer, it's ironic that you chose this one! There's a TON of political history around breakfast cereal composition and advertising as well as ongoing reform campaigns and media criticism. In some cases, this has settled into formal regulations about things like what…

> due to play that same perpetual game of government regulation, industry self-policing, and boundary-testing.

Does anyone think this stuff works, though? It's an cycle of outrage and performative regulation. I'm not sure the same path in another industry is a good idea.

Lucky for parents today there's TV options without commercials.

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