Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption • Hacker News Board

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#201

Post by ElCapitanMarkla » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:04 PM UTC

bamboozled wrote: post #186

vineyardmike wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't really understand why Youtube won't let me create a profile, on my paid family account that I'm paying $29 NZD a month for, which lets me whitelist channels The answer is to this question is always: it is too niche a product feature for a giant corporation to prioritize. This product would require constant work to keep in sync as UIs and features change. It would be one more feature to regression test again…

Of course if it made a bunch of money it would be a top priority though.

Yeah its a weird one, the lack of this feature is whats making me stop giving them money and I wonder how many other families are in the same boat.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#202

Post by yshvrdhn » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:04 PM UTC

ElCapitanMarkla wrote: post #133

I don't really understand why Youtube won't let me create a profile, on my paid family account that I'm paying $29 NZD a month for, which lets me whitelist channels. I'm happy for my kids to have free access to certain channels on youtube, but the mind numbing shorts, and shit they find on random channels just does my head in. And it seems to be getting worse, I'm not sure if its that they are getting older and able…

I think its a similar issue with older generation than dont search and just scroll for content.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#203

Post by shkkmo » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:05 PM UTC

frereubu wrote: post #185

vineyardmike wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't really understand why Youtube won't let me create a profile, on my paid family account that I'm paying $29 NZD a month for, which lets me whitelist channels The answer is to this question is always: it is too niche a product feature for a giant corporation to prioritize. This product would require constant work to keep in sync as UIs and features change. It would be one more feature to regression test again…

That feature isn't what I think the parent comment is asking for. What you've linked to is specifically YouTube Kids, and it's groups of channels whitelisted by the YouTube team. What I think the parent comment is asking for, and I want too, is full availability of all YouTube channels, but the ability to block everything except whitelisted channels. I agree, it's too niche a product. But I often think that people wh…

> I agree, it's too niche a product

I don't think it is that niche. I think lots of people would take advantage of it not just for their kids, but themselves.

The problem is that it is a feature that makes YouTube less "sticky" and thus there is economic incentive against implementing it due to lack of competition in that area. (Their competitors also want to maximize stickiness.)

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#204

Post by squigz » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:05 PM UTC

spicyusername wrote: post #132

soulofmischief wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ridiculous. Would we have had a similar ban against flash video and game websites growing up if it were today? Against AOL Instant Messenger? I already had a local net nanny software to contend with, if the government had also tried preventing me from participating in online culture, assuming I didn't kill myself because of a lack of escape from my abusive situation, I would 100% have ended up being an absolute menac…

We're talking about 8-year-olds here not 15-year-olds, and a website intended for passive consumption, not active participation. I would say the circumstances are pretty different.

8 year olds having unmonitored access to the Internet doesn't seem to me to be the fault of the platforms, the government, or me.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#205

Post by Tenemo » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:05 PM UTC

ivanmontillam wrote: post #45

m101 wrote: post #20

Perhaps this will mean a version of YouTube comes out without YouTube shorts integration. YouTube shorts, imo, legitimises the govts complaint.

I really wish there was a version of YT in Android that did not come with YT Shorts. As a YT Premium user, I should be able to disable it, or at least not make it the first thing it opens when I tap on the app icon. I mean, a legit app, not a 3rd party one that'll get my Google account banned eventually. I had to delete it, using: $ adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.youtube It lasted a month for me t…

There is, I'm a long-time user of ReVanced-patched YouTube. Comes with all sorts of plugins, tweaks and knobs.

In the options, there's a Shorts section, a couple example options: "Hide Shorts in home feed", "Hide Shorts in search results", "Hide Shorts in subscription feed". I do not see any Shorts, ever.

Not only that, apart from not having ads, Revanced YT also has customizable SponsorBlock integration, which skips ads/sponsors in the actual video (community-based feedback).

Instructions on how to install it (no root required) can be found on the revanced subreddit, beware fake sites in the search results, go straight to Reddit or Discord. Highly recommend!

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#206

Post by modeless » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:06 PM UTC

frereubu wrote: post #185

vineyardmike wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't really understand why Youtube won't let me create a profile, on my paid family account that I'm paying $29 NZD a month for, which lets me whitelist channels The answer is to this question is always: it is too niche a product feature for a giant corporation to prioritize. This product would require constant work to keep in sync as UIs and features change. It would be one more feature to regression test again…

That feature isn't what I think the parent comment is asking for. What you've linked to is specifically YouTube Kids, and it's groups of channels whitelisted by the YouTube team. What I think the parent comment is asking for, and I want too, is full availability of all YouTube channels, but the ability to block everything except whitelisted channels. I agree, it's too niche a product. But I often think that people wh…

Why is everyone saying this doesn't exist? It's right there on the linked page! It's called "Approved Content Only" and I assure you that it exists, it's a real feature, it works just like you want, I use it myself, my kids watch Primitive Technology and Smarter Every Day and they can't watch videos I don't whitelist.

It does have a few issues. It's not reliable in showing everything you allow, sometimes things are missing for no reason, other times it will prevent you from whitelisting a video because it contains product placement (why does Google get to decide that for me? I'm an adult and can choose what level of product placement is acceptable for my kids). But it is a true whitelist mode and won't show other videos, just as requested.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#207

Post by ElCapitanMarkla » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:06 PM UTC

modeless wrote: post #159

ElCapitanMarkla wrote: post #133

I don't really understand why Youtube won't let me create a profile, on my paid family account that I'm paying $29 NZD a month for, which lets me whitelist channels. I'm happy for my kids to have free access to certain channels on youtube, but the mind numbing shorts, and shit they find on random channels just does my head in. And it seems to be getting worse, I'm not sure if its that they are getting older and able…

YouTube kids has a feature to only show whitelisted channels and videos. It's been there a few years now. You can share videos to your kids directly from the YouTube app.

Hmmm I'll check it out, I last looked into this about a year ago. I'm pretty sure it still allowed a bunch of crap through that I didn't want them to have access to.

edit: Oh neat they do have a parental approval mode in there now. Last time I was in here they only let you set an age range for the content that you wanted. It still seems a bit weird though, I can select a channel from the list they are presenting me but I can't search for some arbitrary channel to unlock. I'll have another look tonight though

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#208

Post by XorNot » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:06 PM UTC

spicyusername wrote: post #12

Under, say, 10-12 or so, I can understand a blanket ban. In general, the YouTube content aimed at children is pretty vapid and encourages too many parents to use it as parenting auto-pilot. But so much YouTube content is educational or otherwise has significant utility for older children or adults. Seems like a pretty big misstep to outright ban it. And that doesn't even get to the thorny question of how this is supp…

This is all irrelevant though. You can't enforce this without surveiling everyone, and what you're trying to achieve would fail if the target group have unrestricted access to the Internet otherwise.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#209

Post by carabiner » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:07 PM UTC

forgotoldacc wrote: post #46

A couple months ago, I saw people everywhere online (including HN) saying they love the idea of social media bans for kids. They love the idea of keeping people under 18 safe from the dangers of porn and mature games and other unclean things as well. Now governments around the world are acting in unison to happily give those people what they want, and people are suddenly confused and pissed that these laws mean you n…

I love this.

Re: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube, scraps exemption

#210

Post by upboundspiral » Wed, Jul 30, 2025, 11:08 PM UTC

forgotoldacc wrote: post #46

A couple months ago, I saw people everywhere online (including HN) saying they love the idea of social media bans for kids. They love the idea of keeping people under 18 safe from the dangers of porn and mature games and other unclean things as well. Now governments around the world are acting in unison to happily give those people what they want, and people are suddenly confused and pissed that these laws mean you n…

I would like to note that I am probably grossly unqualified to talk about such topics, but one idea that I've had rolling around is that inevitably, if you ask people "should kids be able to watch/read/be exposed to [insert adult thing here]" they will inevitably say no of course not. I feel like this is pretty reasonable. For advocates of privacy to succeed I believe that they will need to not just oppose censorship on a global scale, but provide solutions. One thing that technology has not changed is the unit of human relations. From foster care to single or two parents, the idea of a family is still there in society. In my opinion, this group is greatly underserved, and I do not believe it is enough to say "its the parents responsibility" to curate content. That is a full time job. Now, I will be the first to say that children do not at all need to have a smarphone/ipad/etc until they are in their teens, restricting all technology use can be hard. There needs to be tools that allow parents to choose what their children are allowed to be exposed to. Some parents will choose complete freedom, some will choose some "censorship." But I believe the power should rest in the hands of the parents, and I am strongly opposed to the government dictating this choice. I believe one thing the government can be good at is enforcing standards and providing reference implementations that would allow such curation to be possible. Imagine if you walk into an Apple store and say you are buying a phone for your child, and they tell you: would you like a side of censorship with that? Or if companies like youtube that are a platform with children would need to provide a means for them to be curated, for channels and features to be blocked, etc. I am not sure if what I am proposing is the right way forward but I would love to see governments tackle this problem of giving power back to the parents, instead of seeing governments attempt to enforce their worldviews onto others. I am also interested in how there would a handoff, from a "child-friendly" internet to a fully uncensored one within families. I believe that outright rejecting censorship of what children can access will do nothing to assuage the fears of people that do not want their children accessing random websites, and that a solution that keeps the power in the hands of the people and not the government is needed.