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UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

ofcom.org.uk

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Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#211

Post by jackvalentine »

TacticalCoder wrote: post #205
jackvalentine wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What content promotes eating disorders? There are numerous sites and social media pages on all the major platforms that literally promote anorexia. That you’ve never heard of them should perhaps encourage you to take a more curious and less combative approach to this topic.

> There are numerous sites and social media pages on all the major platforms that literally promote anorexia. Although probably a just cause I'd say that the western world does have an obesity problem though, not an anorexia one. So a better example would be all the sites encouraging people being lazy and fat and eating junk while labelling anything criticizing the unhealthiness of obesity as supposedly engaging in "…

I do agree with you and some of those binge eating/fat acceptance pages came to mind.

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#212

Post by mu53 »

nomilk wrote: post #204
jackvalentine wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What content promotes eating disorders? There are numerous sites and social media pages on all the major platforms that literally promote anorexia. That you’ve never heard of them should perhaps encourage you to take a more curious and less combative approach to this topic.

> encourage you to take a more curious .. But: > Is there a single site ... ? is asking for a tiny bit of evidence (this is gentle curiousness; the antithesis of combative). Earnestly, are you able to provide one site that 'promotes eating disorders', so I can be educated? If the answer is 'any site with charismatic too-slim people', isn't that extremely difficult to administer, and possibly become horribly discrimin…

If you search slang for anorexia and bulimia (ana and mia, respectively), it comes up. The slang helps remove the stigma and feels more friendly/cool. Thinspo/thinspiration is another term used by that community. "Help me love ana".

With that search, there are sites that come up [1]. These terms are also used on reddit, instagram, etc for people to share tips (to be better anorexics/bulimics).

[1] https://strongerinana.weebly.com/index.html

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#213

Post by MiddleEndian »

frikskit wrote: post #199
MiddleEndian wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Social media companies don’t want any kind of regulation because it adds cost to them. Their PR bangs the drum of free speech and people economically tied to the industry gobble it up while trying to ignore the self serving nature of their new beliefs. Disagree here. If it is legally onerous for me to start a forum, I am more inclined to use a large social media site like Facebook, since they will handle the legal p…

Are you suggesting I and all governments should take him at his word? I bet Zuckerberg also wants to pay more taxes too? https://www.bbc.com/news/business-51497961.amp “ Facebook boss 'happy to pay more tax in Europe'” 2020 But I guess the tax avoidance lawyers that he keeps hiring keep on tricking him. Gotta feel bad for the guy, but take everything he says, like “there should be more regulation” seriously and ignor…

Sure, I don't take him at his word as to WHY he would support this legislation. And I think there's likely a reason why he might suggest legislation at all: something more "broadly accepted" like paying more taxes suggests "we are a good company," while supporting legislation normalizes the idea of legislation that doesn't yet broadly exist.

Regardless, I think that it's likely that any legislation will be influenced by big players who act as "experts" so that the resulting laws are more easily followed by them than their (presumably smaller) competitors. And the evidence is in the results. If I were starting an online community in the UK, I'd feel much safer legally using Facebook (or Reddit or Discord) than I would starting my own forum.

Looks like people who already run online communities agree: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42433044

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#214

Post by nomilk »

jackvalentine wrote: post #210
nomilk wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> encourage you to take a more curious .. But: > Is there a single site ... ? is asking for a tiny bit of evidence (this is gentle curiousness; the antithesis of combative). Earnestly, are you able to provide one site that 'promotes eating disorders', so I can be educated? If the answer is 'any site with charismatic too-slim people', isn't that extremely difficult to administer, and possibly become horribly discrimin…

If you come from an angle of ‘I’ve never seen it therefor it’s just whack a mole’ don’t be surprised if people read it as simple rejection rather than curiosity. Using language like ‘Is there a single site?’ doubles down on it. This article describes social media groups, on the major platforms, that encourage eating disorders https://rollingout.com/2024/10/08/eating-disorder-groups-on-... Young children being treated…

But the article doesn't give a single site or name a single community; it provides zero evidence of its claims.

> Camille, a 20-year-old who has struggled with an eating disorder since middle school, described her community as initially intended to be a safe space but ultimately spiraling out of control due to algorithmic influence

If these claims are true, why not simply demonstrate it; at least state the name of the community so readers can cross reference (to ensure it's not 'boogyman' | typical alarmist-bait), or show us screenshots, or create a dummy twitter account and scroll down the feed as evidence of 'algorithmic influence'. That's 15 minutes work. Why doesn't the journalist do that? Is it possible these things aren't nearly as bad as they claim?

Algorithms will promote what the user clicks on and engages with. Simply: three dots -> Not interested in this post. That retrains the algorithm. And if people are seeking harmful content, they'll find it with or without algorithms, with or without twitter, with or without the internet! Are we banning books next? And conversation? What about reasoning in one's own mind, that too?

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#215

Post by protocolture »

lmm wrote: post #202
protocolture wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>waste police time. I dont know if you intended it but "wasting police time" is a pretty good book on the subject of administrative detections.

It's not. It's a bunch of nonconstructive old-man-yells-at-cloud complaints. While it identifies a somewhat deep problem with crime metrics (what should you do when a reported crime was a real incident, but not something that warrants actually bringing charges or otherwise following up - something where "a policeman had a word with the guy" is actually the right solution that all parties are happy with) it contribute…

Made it worse if you consider that the book prompted authorities to bury the problem further. They went from claiming administrative detections didnt exist, to admitting they exist, to obfuscating the system so they can claim administrative detections no longer exist.

>it contributes nothing to solving that problem

His solution was to remove administrative detections, so that beat cops dont:

1. Get rewarded for "detecting" 30 crimes, where the 30 crimes was 10 people being harmless in public 2. Spend all their time writing reports about their administrative detections instead of being a visible presence.

"a policeman had a word with the guy" is I believe the authors wish. He seems to make a case for removing police powers to the point where they are little more than private citizens.

I quite liked the old man yells at cloud format. But I didnt like his obsession with the yank sherrif.

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#216

Post by wruza »

nomilk wrote: post #194

> People in the UK will be better protected from illegal harms online What are these 'illegal harms'? I'm online 10+ hours a day for 10 years straight and never seen one. (not assuming they don't exist, but their prevalence/impact might be inflated). If you have to go looking for them, isn't this just 'whack a mole' (since 'online harms' will hard to 100% eradicate), but at the expense of destroying parts of the inte…

What content promotes eating disorders?!

They’re talking about thinspo. Was pretty popular and survived search bans on many platforms. To save you a search, it’s mostly about getting thing legs that do not touch and overall ~40kg body type.

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#217

Post by tdeck »

xyzzy4747 wrote: post #206
nomilk wrote: post #194

> People in the UK will be better protected from illegal harms online What are these 'illegal harms'? I'm online 10+ hours a day for 10 years straight and never seen one. (not assuming they don't exist, but their prevalence/impact might be inflated). If you have to go looking for them, isn't this just 'whack a mole' (since 'online harms' will hard to 100% eradicate), but at the expense of destroying parts of the inte…

This forum site for example actively encourages and supports people who want to commit suicide: https://sanctioned-suicide.net/ Many of their members have died after encouraging each other to take the next step. They used to be on Reddit but got banned there a few years ago. Would you want your children or young adults spending time there?

I'm assuming this is the site mentioned in this video? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C3y6SsGAWks it might be best to remove the actual link so people in a bad mental state don't end up there. Cc @dang

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#218

Post by nomilk »

mu53 wrote: post #212
nomilk wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> encourage you to take a more curious .. But: > Is there a single site ... ? is asking for a tiny bit of evidence (this is gentle curiousness; the antithesis of combative). Earnestly, are you able to provide one site that 'promotes eating disorders', so I can be educated? If the answer is 'any site with charismatic too-slim people', isn't that extremely difficult to administer, and possibly become horribly discrimin…

If you search slang for anorexia and bulimia (ana and mia, respectively), it comes up. The slang helps remove the stigma and feels more friendly/cool. Thinspo/thinspiration is another term used by that community. "Help me love ana". With that search, there are sites that come up [1]. These terms are also used on reddit, instagram, etc for people to share tips (to be better anorexics/bulimics). [1] https://strongerina…

Thanks for the example.

> This website is for support for those with an eating disorder who feel alone and by themself with this issue.

Where are people with anorexia and bulimia supposed to get support/information if forums about the topics are untenable?

Many can't beat the condition, and there's potential benefit in learning to accept and live with it.

I'm not saying the site is unequivocally good, just that it's not unequivocally bad, therefore onerous regulation that has huge side-effects on information sharing to curb something that's arguably net-beneficial is dubious and shouldn't be pursued without strong evidence that 1. It will work as intended, and 2. It will actually be beneficial.

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#219

Post by nomilk »

wruza wrote: post #216
nomilk wrote: post #194

> People in the UK will be better protected from illegal harms online What are these 'illegal harms'? I'm online 10+ hours a day for 10 years straight and never seen one. (not assuming they don't exist, but their prevalence/impact might be inflated). If you have to go looking for them, isn't this just 'whack a mole' (since 'online harms' will hard to 100% eradicate), but at the expense of destroying parts of the inte…

What content promotes eating disorders?! They’re talking about thinspo. Was pretty popular and survived search bans on many platforms. To save you a search, it’s mostly about getting thing legs that do not touch and overall ~40kg body type.

How's thinspo different to fat-acceptance communities? (I have nothing against either, I think people ought to be free to pursue information on their body-type)

Re: UK's Online Safety Act comes into force

#220

Post by [deleted] »

xyzzy4747 wrote: post #206
nomilk wrote: post #194

> People in the UK will be better protected from illegal harms online What are these 'illegal harms'? I'm online 10+ hours a day for 10 years straight and never seen one. (not assuming they don't exist, but their prevalence/impact might be inflated). If you have to go looking for them, isn't this just 'whack a mole' (since 'online harms' will hard to 100% eradicate), but at the expense of destroying parts of the inte…

This forum site for example actively encourages and supports people who want to commit suicide: https://sanctioned-suicide.net/ Many of their members have died after encouraging each other to take the next step. They used to be on Reddit but got banned there a few years ago. Would you want your children or young adults spending time there?

[deleted]
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