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Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

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Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#61

Post by dxuh »

I feel like this is ultimately uninteresting. This doesn't change anyone's image of these companies. We know they are evil. They have done worse and they will do worse. They never got a meaningful punishment and I have no reason to believe they will. All they get is outrage on the internet, which is effectively meaningless to them.

The files being examined right now shows me that there is nothing bad enough to actually make anything happen, no matter how absurdly evil it is. Are we too easily distracted? Or are we too used to inhumanity now? Or are the powerful simply more powerful than most of the rest of the planet?

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#62

Post by mikkupikku »

integralid wrote: post #31
mikkupikku wrote: post #10

I fully expect this to get ignored like all the other similar revelations. Heads should roll, literally, but nothing will happen. Does anybody have any earnest hope for reform? Even in Europe where the public is supposedly keyed in, and where there is some political traction for getting away from American companies, nobody seems to take the idea of banning these corporations seriously.

The idea of banning meta or Google is indeed not serious. What's realistic is forcing them to behave by issuing fines that make such behavior prohibitively expensive. Admittedly there's nobody doing that in Europe seriously yet, but that's because the current unhinged head of American state has meltdown every time American bigtech get a wrist slap.

> What's realistic is forcing them to behave by issuing fines that make such behavior prohibitively expensive.

Europeans have been saying that for what, 20 years now? How long does it have to not work before we stop saying that it's a realistic solution?

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#63

Post by mmooss »

mikkupikku wrote: post #10

I fully expect this to get ignored like all the other similar revelations. Heads should roll, literally, but nothing will happen. Does anybody have any earnest hope for reform? Even in Europe where the public is supposedly keyed in, and where there is some political traction for getting away from American companies, nobody seems to take the idea of banning these corporations seriously.

Social media is being banned for minors in multiple countries, and more are seriously considering it.

But if people keep proselytizing that nothing will happen and all is hopeless, it's going to be hard to get people together to support a change. You and others here are doing the work of social media companies by spreading that - on social media. In fact, nothing can stop the public if they want something.

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#65

Post by soco »

tryauuum wrote: post #36
mikkupikku wrote: post #10

I fully expect this to get ignored like all the other similar revelations. Heads should roll, literally, but nothing will happen. Does anybody have any earnest hope for reform? Even in Europe where the public is supposedly keyed in, and where there is some political traction for getting away from American companies, nobody seems to take the idea of banning these corporations seriously.

how would you ban it? I don't want the russian-style ban enforced by ISPs Probably punishing companies who pay YouTube for ads would work

On which grounds would you punish some companies which are using a fully legal platform? If you had beef with the ad contents, you'd punish them already for that. But if you have beef with the platform algorithms, punish them for exactly that. Not over proxies! As long the algorithm was designed for creating dependence, than regulate that - exactly like you (should) regulate other substances creating dependence. And some countries are going exactly this way: not only Australia but also Finland, Spain...

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#66

Post by worik »

betaby wrote: post #22

Meanwhile 2 billion Coca Colas are sold per day. That's over 75 million kgs of sugar/day - no one bats an eye. Teen/kid addiction to sugar was and is a priority. Social networks is a sugar for minds.

> no one bats an eye.

Untrue

My six year old grand child made up a food related game for me to play with them that involved penalties for choosing food with sugar.

Somebody is getting to them, good

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#67

Post by soco »

sharts wrote: post #9

This is obvious for anyone that understands sales and marketing. The real question isn’t whether this was true—the question is why does anyone expect this revelation would change anything? They made their wealth. They bought their politicians. In the worst possible case for them they would pay some fee that amounts to absolutely nothing making a dent in their personal day to day lives as a consequence of their action…

Based on the aggressive reactions all across the billionaire board toward the European wrist-slap initiative, I would guess Europe is moving in the correct direction with it and the slaps would correctly hurt.

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#68

Post by pembrook »

This reads like an Onion headline.

Gosh, I hope the media never unearths the documents on my company.

They’ll learn that keeping my customers coming back was also my top priority. The horror!

If they dig a little deeper they might uncover a vast conspiracy, that every business on earth has been secretly conspiring for decades to give people a service so good they’ll come back again and again for it.

If this isn’t Pulitzer Prize winning journalism I don’t know what is.

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#69

Post by reorder9695 »

jmusall wrote: post #28
mikkupikku wrote: post #10

I fully expect this to get ignored like all the other similar revelations. Heads should roll, literally, but nothing will happen. Does anybody have any earnest hope for reform? Even in Europe where the public is supposedly keyed in, and where there is some political traction for getting away from American companies, nobody seems to take the idea of banning these corporations seriously.

I think the possibility of banning certain sites at least for minors is being discussed, after Australia set the precedent. But this of course has downsides, too, as some form of verification has to be implemented, that would almost certainly reduce anonymity and carry risks to personal data protection. A complete ban is unrealistic since people actually like to use these platforms. Plus, it would certainly entail ma…

Does that outweigh the loss of privacy involved? I really don't think it does personally, I should not have to show anyone ID to have an Instagram account, privacy and anonymity is a feature not a bug.

Re: Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top priority"

#70

Post by jhhh »

shaftway wrote: post #11

I feel like there are some key differences between the companies though. The second one outlined for Meta is: > Heavily-redacted undated internal document discussing “School Blasts” as a strategy for gaining more high school users (mass notifications sent during the school day). This sounds a lot like Meta being intentionally disruptive. The first one outlined for YouTube is: > Slidedeck on the role that YouTube’s au…

YouTube Shorts exist, which they brag about hours watched, so I don't think they really care about those things at all.
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