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New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

theguardian.com

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Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#331

Post by nashashmi »

tristanj wrote: post #201
tmp10423288442 wrote: post #109

A lot of people on this story are making the usual snarky remarks that, oh, this is just a slap on the wrist—some trivial proportion of Meta’s global revenue. And that is true, but unlike the EU, for example, New Mexico is a tiny jurisdiction. It only has a little bit more than 2 million people. So actually, a fine—or a judgment—of $942 million that applies just to New Mexico is enormous. If you look at Meta’s revenu…

This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18. New Mexico has ~450,000 people under age 18, of which roughly 140,000 are between ages 13-17 (Meta officially requires age 13+ to use their platforms). Recent Pew surveys of U.S. teens ages 13–17 show ~70% of teenagers use Instagram and ~30% use Facebook. In New Mexico,…

I am not sure if a $7k payout is sufficient for the harm it has caused. Remember some people committed suicide. Some have mental problems

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#332

Post by vkou »

barbazoo wrote: post #325
tristanj wrote: post #5

Per the court ruling [0], the specific law that Meta violated was New Mexico’s public-nuisance law, NMSA 1978 § 30-8-1. The relevant section that was violated is [1]: A public nuisance consists of knowingly creating, performing or maintaining anything affecting any number of citizens without lawful authority which is either: - A. injurious to public health, safety, morals or welfare; or - B. interferes with the exerc…

> The judge found that Meta’s operation of Facebook and Instagram created a public nuisance which injured public health, safety, and welfare; and burdened public schools, hospitals, and law enforcement. Hopefully one day this is what people think of when they hear people say "I work for Meta".

It'll probably happen the day after 'Thank you for your service' will take stock of the human misery that service has inflicted upon the world. I wouldn't hold my breath.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#333

Post by jumpinjack710 »

brookst wrote: post #248
tristanj wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18. New Mexico has ~450,000 people under age 18, of which roughly 140,000 are between ages 13-17 (Meta officially requires age 13+ to use their platforms). Recent Pew surveys of U.S. teens ages 13–17 show ~70% of teenagers use Instagram and ~30% use Facebook. In New Mexico,…

IDK, even if you take your analysis to the extreme and say only 1% of those children suffered actual harm, it doesn’t seem unreasonable that the cost would be > $725k each, measured in impact to lifetime earnings plus the costs to their parents and community. There’s a good argument for using the funds to support mental health programs, but as far as paying for damage done, Meta is getting off very light here. Classi…

[dead]

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#334

Post by cheschire »

59percentmore wrote: post #308
tristanj wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18. New Mexico has ~450,000 people under age 18, of which roughly 140,000 are between ages 13-17 (Meta officially requires age 13+ to use their platforms). Recent Pew surveys of U.S. teens ages 13–17 show ~70% of teenagers use Instagram and ~30% use Facebook. In New Mexico,…

The point of a fine is to change behavior. It's not outsize if it's enough to do that. >If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties, these kids could end up rewarded with thousands of dollars for just for having a Facebook or Instagram account. Good. https://www.thefader.com/2015/12/03/on-fleek-peaches-monroee... These platforms are so profitable precisely because they fleece users for way more va…

I feel like you skipped the next sentence from GP. This type of award might not balance the equation the way you think it does.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#335

Post by deepsun »

nujabe wrote: post #135
deepsun wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure Meta will drag the case in appeals for many years until the order becomes irrelevant. Cheaper than paying $942m.

Why would dragging it on make the order irrelevant?

One way is an appeal may cancel the order or reduce the amount.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#336

Post by jmye »

barbazoo wrote: post #325
tristanj wrote: post #5

Per the court ruling [0], the specific law that Meta violated was New Mexico’s public-nuisance law, NMSA 1978 § 30-8-1. The relevant section that was violated is [1]: A public nuisance consists of knowingly creating, performing or maintaining anything affecting any number of citizens without lawful authority which is either: - A. injurious to public health, safety, morals or welfare; or - B. interferes with the exerc…

> The judge found that Meta’s operation of Facebook and Instagram created a public nuisance which injured public health, safety, and welfare; and burdened public schools, hospitals, and law enforcement. Hopefully one day this is what people think of when they hear people say "I work for Meta".

[dead]

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#338

Post by flatline »

cwmoore wrote: post #320
tgv wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties Did you even read the first line of the article? "A New Mexico court has ordered Meta ... to pay $567m into a fund aimed at redressing adverse mental health impacts". It does NOT go to the children's purses. There's also a fine, which --as fines do-- goes to the state. Not to the individual children. > outsized Are you arguing it should be less?

It should be honest that “redressing adverse mental health impacts” is code for “more sweet government jobs”.

As critical as I am of NM, I don’t know that this is true. The state has been funding mental healthcare for 2+ years out of gross receipts revenue. A large part of this goes to Medicaid recipients - NM is one of the highest paying states for Medicaid providers, at least for mental health. The money from this may very well go into a public coffer used for similar purposes, ultimately paying out to private providers while mostly bypassing our broken health insurance system.

I do question whether therapy services and the like are the best use of public funds for the people of NM. A lot of the state’s problems stem from a lack of economic opportunities, therapy isn’t going to help that. The state also carries a heavy burden of generational trauma which this could go some ways towards addressing, I suppose.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#339

Post by SoftTalker »

Barrin92 wrote: post #98
Sha1rholder wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what aspect is Playboy magazines superior?

it contained significantly less extreme content. There's studies on kids as young as 12 routinely being exposed to sexual violence, practices such as choking or degrading activity in porn and viewing it as so normal that young women report being expected to take part in it. Fetishes and kinks that were reserved for adults are now normalized among teens. "In an essay published in The Free Press in August, 16-year-old…

> it contained significantly less extreme content

And I think that's understating it. I have not read a Playboy (is it even still in print?) since I was a teenager. At that time, the pictures showed breasts and maybe some pubic hair. Even the more "hardcore" magazines that were generally available such as Penthouse and Hustler were tame compared to even the front-page thumbnails on Pornhub. There were more explicit magazines produced, but you could only get them in "adult" bookstores and if you were under 18 you could not get in, and if you were over 18 there was a certain fear/shame of possibly being seen there that kept most people away.

If you really wanted it you could get hardcore stuff of course, but it was a lot more effort and cost compared to just opening a web browser. It was not something most people had ever really seen, certainly not among young children and teens.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#340

Post by mock-possum »

brookst wrote: post #248
tristanj wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18. New Mexico has ~450,000 people under age 18, of which roughly 140,000 are between ages 13-17 (Meta officially requires age 13+ to use their platforms). Recent Pew surveys of U.S. teens ages 13–17 show ~70% of teenagers use Instagram and ~30% use Facebook. In New Mexico,…

IDK, even if you take your analysis to the extreme and say only 1% of those children suffered actual harm, it doesn’t seem unreasonable that the cost would be > $725k each, measured in impact to lifetime earnings plus the costs to their parents and community. There’s a good argument for using the funds to support mental health programs, but as far as paying for damage done, Meta is getting off very light here. Classi…

That’s $7.25k, not $725k
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