The amount is too small, as usual, and is just a slightly annoying cost of doing business.
Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
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Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#242Would be nice to be able to enable these features as an adult (stop autoplay videos and no algorithmic feed). Also, I’m surprised by the lack of enforcement to remove infinite scrolling.
Yes, and also if only I could disable shorts and the comment section in youtube.
If you are on Android, you can use Revanced Manager or Morphe to patch the YouTube apk with all kinds of controls that include the ability to hide shorts and the comments section. Ad blocking works well too but using those patches requires a bit of a cat and mouse game since YouTube backend updates break things and require occasionally patching a newer apk version. You can also enable all of the client-side YouTube premium features.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agreed, especially considering Meta made $60.46 billion in profit in 2025 alone.
This is a settlement between Meta and 48 states. Individuals can still sue them for harm, and one notable case had them pay 4.2 million. There are hundreds of thousands of claims pending. The federal government still has the ability to sue or fine Meta as well.
>one notable case had them pay 4.2mil
Ok so if most individuals that care sue them it will become a.. $17B fine. Doesn't sound that impressive either.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
Market cap isn't real money
Then they may as well pay out 10% of the stock.
What % of META (shares) are owned by Meta Platforms Inc.?
Don't get me wrong, I'm happy for e.g. Zuckerberg personally to be ordered to hand over all his shares as any given penalty, but as stated what you describe sounds like a way to avoid paying a penalty.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#245a few weeks ago i was visiting my parents and caught a little bit of a documentary they had on.
it all became clear as day.
apparently in the 70s used car salesmen would manipulate the odometers in cars they were selling to make the cars appear to have really low mileage. they would also do other random stuff like put saw dust in the transmission to hide any kind of knocking noises.
the media started doing investigations into this which led to laws making those kind of things illegal.
they had tons of interviews with various owners of the car lot chains who were eventually found guilty of things like rolling back odometers. and every single one of them sounded sleazy and confident. every single one of these guys who were caught red handed blamed the buyers saying things like:
“it’s not my fault they bought a shit car.”
we allowed a bunch of greasy slimey used car salesmen to take over. slimey used car salesmen in quarter-zips who sound confident.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#246>Meta will impose daily usage limits and restrict nighttime usage by children who use Facebook and Instagram, and enhance measures to prevent children from accessing age-restricted content So meta won. The only thing I'm asking for is better control over my social media. Let me remove infinite scroll on Instagram and don't show me things I have explicitly followed on Facebook. And do this setting by default and a cig…
As someone who doesn't use social media please explain. Is it not possible for people to just delete the apps and stop using them? Is the addiction so strong at this point that people don't have the willpower to stop?
it may be possible for some people, I don't know.
does Meta have internal research that uses the word addiction that would come up in discovery? probably.
so there's more than one side of this. a little bit of a chance in the health & science department, a little bit of a chance in the legal department, that the plaintiffs would prevail.
that said, are people willing to ban alcohol and tobacco fully? and most "recreational" drugs? the cultural side is the least informative, because you can't litigate culture, it's arbitrary, hypocrisy is the rule, not the exception.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
You think the state should restrict what adults do on their phones?
The state already restricts what adults do on their phones. You can't buy drugs or look at CSAM. You can't use your phone while driving or operating dangerous machinery. You can't install apps which facilitate piracy. You can't wipe your phone when the state lawfully requests it from you. The list goes on.
>You can't install apps which facilitate piracy.
Initially read this as "can't install apps which facilitate privacy."
And that was before I got to your next sentence . . .
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
>[irreparably damaging] children's minds I’d love for someone to get me into Mark Zuckerberg’s head on why he should keep doing what he’s doing.
There was an ad going around for a while on how Instagram was trying to be safer for teens with parent controls, etc. If I were to guess, he's thinking he can get the good (if there is any good to be found) without the bad still using more controls/technology.
This is the best example of how Meta actually implements addiction forming apps.
The Insta Ads: Teens can set daily watch time limits.
The reality: When the teen exceeds their set daily watch time limit, the notification includes option to skip and continue watching !!!
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
He's not going to willingly shutdown his company, the same reason a casino will not just suddenly close up shop. The owner would have to have a dramatic shift in worldview to delete the whole thing.
Strawman, no one said anything about shutting down the company. Even without the government telling them, they shouldn't be damaging children.
The market is telling them they need to make number go up.
Once all the growth and new ideas were consumed, the only ways to make number go up, is to extract more profits.
This means doing everything within the law, and as safely as they can within the grey area, to ensure they hit those numbers.
They had an existential risk when TikTok showed up, and the design idea behind TikTok was even more addictive and less community oriented than Meta.
Do note: I am not giving Meta a pass. Just ensuring the system of incentives that got us here is interrogated and a better way forward is thought of.
Re: Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children
#250Pay 25% from your 2025 profit for harming children since at least 2019 and be able to continue doing so. Sounds like a loss for society and a win for Meta.
The article outlines several changes Meta is having to implement that curbs the "and be able to continue doing so" argument a bit. That said, I wish these settlements included tobacco-esque requirements for ongoing funds to educate people. The tobacco settlement funds have been somewhat successful.
Somehow I have no faith that these changes will be enforced, or appropriately drawn up by parties who actually have the knowledge to do so.