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EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

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Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#331

Post by throwaway902984 »

xigoi wrote: post #211
Analemma_ wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever browsed by New and seen the firehose of shit which doesn’t make it to the front page? HN sorted by new is effectively useless and you might as well shut the site down at that point. “Chronological only” might work for something like Twitter where you’re choosing to follow specific individuals to see their posts, it can’t work for curation sites like HN/Reddit.

That could be solved by allowing users to filter by score or number of comments.

Which would lead to everyone having their own personalized front page? Not controlled by dang so much but still.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#332

Post by kyledrake »

AshleyGrant wrote: post #306
kyledrake wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're mad at me for being flippant about depression while you're being flippant about social media, pot calling the kettle black. I'm not the one that started flattening every bad habit or unhealthy technology into "basically cigarettes and heroin". If everything addictive is treated as morally and medically equivalent to hard opioid abuse or crippling nicotine addiction, then the language we use to talk about actua…

> You're mad at me for being flippant about depression while you're being flippant about social media, pot calling the kettle black. Where did I do that? I stopped reading your comment after that since you accused me of saying stuff I never said, so whatever you wrote is unworthy of my attention.

I agree with you, please don't read any of this. Not wanting a government controlling online content (with police with guns!) on a false pretense that "Instagram is cigarettes" is apparently a fringe opinion now and I wouldn't want to damage your brain and make you addicted to my terrible posts.

To everyone else reading this: go back to when you were a teenager, and ask yourself how cool you would be with your government saying you can't look at web sites and forums because they're "too addictive", or you can't listen to Nine Inch Nails because it's "for adults only", or Geocities has to be shut down or you need to be carded to use it because it has "adult content" (it had a lot of adult content, including a robust LGBT community when it was very much not safe to host that content). How would you have felt about that?

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#334

Post by viktorcode »

conception wrote: post #19

This is pretty easy to solve. If you present data by algorithm, you are no longer an impartial common carrier and are liable for the content you present. If the user decides you don’t, ala social media 1.0.

Define "algorithm" then. I would argue that "sort by date, excluding stuff the user already watched" is already an algorithm.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#335

Post by rmnwski »

What I really enjoy about hn is the fact that it’s not infinite scrolling. I scan the front page, if something grabs my attention, I’ll look at. If something has a lot of comments, it seems important. When I’m done scanning/reading, I’m done. On social media, you’re never done.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#336

Post by NewsaHackO »

palata wrote: post #55
eowln wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>privacy-preserving age verification No such thing.

That's my problem with the debate: people like you seem very proud to be uninformed. It exists as much as end-to-end encryption exists. It's cryptography, it's not up to debate. But people who have no clue are very vocal about their belief that it does not exist.

I also am not aware of any, do you have any examples?

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#337

Post by cmrdporcupine »

viktorcode wrote: post #334
conception wrote: post #19

This is pretty easy to solve. If you present data by algorithm, you are no longer an impartial common carrier and are liable for the content you present. If the user decides you don’t, ala social media 1.0.

Define "algorithm" then. I would argue that "sort by date, excluding stuff the user already watched" is already an algorithm.

This is just pedantic. "Algorithm" is obviously shorthand for: a recommendations system that shows me things I didn't explicitly opt into.

Compare e.g. Mastodon vs Twitter or Bluesky. The former simply won't show you anything you didn't explicitly subscribe to, and there's no hidden ranking system.

The law is not a computer program. It is up to human interpretation. The law merely needs to define the intent, which is actually fairly easy to explain: you're not a common carrier if you're mediating and promoting and ranking and pushing beyond what the user has subscribed to with their choices.

You can get technical that "sorting" and "filtering" is a form of that, but you'd be applying the lens of a software engineer, not a lawyer.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#338

Post by abyssin »

palata wrote: post #39
Pesthuf wrote: post #23

Tell me: why are these algorithms suddenly okay when the victim turns 18? They are bad for everyone and if you’re willing to regulate them, make them illegal to be used on anyone.

Same as for the cigarette: it's a lot easier to regulate stuff for kids, because we as a society tend to agree that they need to be protected. Much harder to do with adults, because it is much less of a consensus.

I genuinely wonder if there would be any end user against banning these algorithms. I’d love rss style content providers back. Just let me freely subscribe to accounts.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#339

Post by ryandrake »

Aurornis wrote: post #283
andrewjf wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with what OOP said. But it’s not my intent to “shut sites down.” I have this view to try to increase diversity of media consumption and break people out of echo chambers. If your business model is so shit you have to exploit weaknesses in human brains to keep people viewing ads and can’t adapt, then that’s your problem. If you have an algorithm whose sole purpose is to “engagement” with your own platform (by…

> I have this view to try to increase diversity of media consumption and break people out of echo chambers. Making sites liable for all user-posted content would do the reverse of this. Every platform that lets people submit content would have to stop doing that, because it’s an impossible liability to manage. You’d have to host your own site. You wouldn’t be able to share anything about it on a social media site bec…

Newspaper "Letters to the Editor" manage to do this. Users "submit" things to the newspaper, the editor curates and decides what to keep and what not to, and then the newspaper publishes the user generated content. Just like social media: Users submit things to the site, TheAlgorithm curates and decides what to keep and what not to, and then the site publishes the user generated content.

If web sites and social media can't "scale" to do this, then maybe they should scale down. "Making sites liable for all user-posted content" would not kill social media, but would definitely scope it down to what can be effectively curated.

Re: EU to crack down on TikTok, Instagram's 'addictive design' targeting kids

#340

Post by herf »

Aurornis wrote: post #156
jrflo wrote: post #118

I heard someone on a podcast call social media algorithms "the modern-day cigarette" and that really resonated with me. These companies know their product is addictive and bad for users, but they keep pushing it anyways. Like cigarettes, it's bad for everyone, not just kids. I made an algorithm blocker for Safari because of that and it's actually crazy how much more pleasant social media is if you don't have recommen…

If you didn’t notice, this comment is an ad for a paid app trying to capitalize on social media anger. I respect the hustle, but this is not a neutral comment on the topic due to the financial interest. There are many free alternative plugins for targeting social media feeds if someone wants to filter these.

Hang on, this is a $2.99 one-time payment - below the level you can even buy ads and make a profit. There is no way he's trying to make billions of dollars this way, and it's honest and smart. Consider the perspective - what happens with the "free alternatives"? You know they're not free: either they already track you, or someone buys them and turns them into spyware. We need more things like this, not less.
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