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The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

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Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#581

Post by account42 »

SturgeonsLaw wrote: post #344
nullbio wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feels more like a joint effort given the way the world is going with AI. Likely, everyone who has access to the internet will require a passport to authenticate and access all websites, including AI bots. That way, any illegitimate activity from AI bots can be traced back to individuals.

If there was to be a small silver lining out of all this, then a way to verify human comments would be nice. But it's not worth the privacy impacts and chilling of free speech.

I'm not sure that verifying a human identity for comments is even that useful as there are already plenty of people comfortably with putting their own name on slop.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#582

Post by account42 »

nullbio wrote: post #351
SturgeonsLaw wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there was to be a small silver lining out of all this, then a way to verify human comments would be nice. But it's not worth the privacy impacts and chilling of free speech.

Yeah, I have no idea what a good solution is that solves what is coming when malicious actors start flooding the web with agents at hyperscale, because that is certainly going to come. I'm really hoping smart people can figure out a good middleground before the government does something stupid. Because right now, their two cannons are either: - Ban open-weight/open-source models and self-hosted LLMs - Require interne…

> You ban something for law abiding citizens and only criminals will use it

Combine it with harsh enough punishments and few criminals will be willing to risk it. That's how we deal with other crimes that are "hard to enforce" already.

And remember, the optimum amount of crime is not zero. Both because the cost of getting it to zero is too high to bear and because sometimes the morally correct thing to do is to break the rules-as-written.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#583

Post by account42 »

SidewaysView wrote: post #558
trashb wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

who decides what are bad/problematic/unacceptable books?

Everyone who isn't a dangerous creepy loser, as a rule. We generally call that "society." Change isn't easy. Any particular individual won't necessarily agree with every change when they first see it. But justice and accountability aren't up to the individual - they're up to society. Our duty is only to be decent people and carry that progress forward.

What if we decide that you're the dangerous creepy loser? Or let's say, a witch.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#584

Post by account42 »

ars wrote: post #281
bArray wrote: post #225

Anybody else think it is weird that suddenly all Western countries suddenly want to lockdown the internet to "protect the children"? There is surely an international special interest group lobbying for this?

Why is it weird? Social media has existed for around the same amount of time for all western countries, and people have noticed the harm at around the same time everywhere. Why do you require some special interest? Ordinary people are seeing the harm and demanding help. Tech companies did themselves no favors by locking down phones and accounts to the point that it's impossible for parents to police and/or check thei…

> Tech companies did themselves no favors by locking down phones and accounts to the point that it's impossible for parents to police and/or check their kids phones.

How is it impossible? Worst case, parents can make the kids unlock the device and take it away if the kid does not comply. Not that such extreme measures should ever be needed if there aren't significant pre-existing parenting failures.

And at some age the parent's job should be to make sure the kid can act responsibly on its own rather than micromanaging every possible danger.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#585

Post by account42 »

ars wrote: post #553
Amezarak wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've yet to meet an ordinary person who supports any of this, though they might agree if vaguely prompted about it without detail. They certainly aren't lobbying their politicians about it. This is top down, not bottom up. > So now that parents have been blocked from parenting, who else is going to do it? I'm a parent. Nobody has been blocked from parenting by tech companies.

We are in different circles, because everyone in my circle is desperate for a solution to unrestricted phone use by kids. > I'm a parent. Nobody has been blocked from parenting by tech companies. What age? Because they absolutely have. Wait till your kid has instragram and snapchat and WhatsApp and they can talk to random adults, or get bullied and you have no way to know. Wait till they lock their phone, and you hav…

Your kid also will have to deal with all of that as an adult so prepare them to deal with it instead of sheltering them. Either trust the kid to make their own decisions because you have prepared them or only give the kid the device under the agreement that it can be inspected and take it away if the agreement is broken. It's also perfectly possible to enforce device time limits without any technical means. If the kids school undermines your values regarding tech use then find a better school. None of this requires an age verification panopticon. None of this even requires support from the device vendors for parental controls. All it requires is a backbone and, yes, effort.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#586

Post by account42 »

qball wrote: post #546
nonethewiser wrote: post #527

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By definition everyone agrees we should't overprotect kids online. It's in the word "overprotected." The claim I'm making is that they are underprotected online. I think you are concerned about the pendulum swinging too far in the other direction but I don't think I said anything that suggests that should happen. Unless perhaps you think the current amount of protection is already the maximal amount that is useful?

>The claim I'm making is that they are underprotected online. Yes, and not only is it wrong (they are protected sufficiently), but giving an inch to the same moral impulses and people that resulted in them being overprotected in the real world will naturally result in them taking a mile. The ideal number of human beings that do stupid shit and pay for it is not zero, nor can it be in any functioning society.

I would even argue that doing stupid shit and paying for it is part of growing up, just as long as the degree is limited to not be life shattering.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#587

Post by account42 »

EmbarrassedHelp wrote: post #559
betadeltic wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bit of an off-topic, as age checks are not solution to this, it's just the usual "think of the children" narrative. However, there are publicists like Jonathan Haidt who have observed the link between kids mental health and use of social media. (among other things) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Anxious_Generation

Jonathan Haidt's book isn't taken seriously in academia. He also believes that social media turns kids transgender, and that may be part the reason that he's aggressively lobbying for bans enforced with mandatory age verification.

Both claims are probably true in the sense that social media is the main way that kids get exposed to broader society these days but not in the way that forcing kids off of social media will mean that they are no longer affected by the root causes.

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#588

Post by account42 »

jtmarl1n wrote: post #265
GeekyBear wrote: post #201

Parents already have the ability to lock down Android or iOS devices for their own children, if they choose to do so.

Parental controls are extremely weak on all the major platforms. Apple, Google, Amazon, etc. they all have them so they can check the box but they are not good and certainly not a solution. That said, it is better than nothing, but that’s about it.

They are not good compared to what? The control that parents had what kids did in the woods or at the mall before smartphones?

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#589

Post by feb012025 »

bArray wrote: post #225

Anybody else think it is weird that suddenly all Western countries suddenly want to lockdown the internet to "protect the children"? There is surely an international special interest group lobbying for this?

They've been saying it on stage for a couple years now:

https://x.com/HotSpotHotSpot/status/1996018001368563842

Re: The KIDS Act would require age checks to get online

#590

Post by SidewaysView »

account42 wrote: post #583
SidewaysView wrote: post #558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone who isn't a dangerous creepy loser, as a rule. We generally call that "society." Change isn't easy. Any particular individual won't necessarily agree with every change when they first see it. But justice and accountability aren't up to the individual - they're up to society. Our duty is only to be decent people and carry that progress forward.

What if we decide that you 're the dangerous creepy loser? Or let's say, a witch.

You'd be welcome to debate bro with the rest of the basement dwellers. Until it's time for "pop goes the Kirkoid."
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