The fact that they'll ban kids from accessing every social media except Reddit tells you everything you need to know about the real motives behind this "ban".
Of course it is going to fail especially if the social media networks are incentivized to make sure that it fails. The penalties should have been set at a per user basis.
It has been banned for a few months. Hardly a failure.
It will be a failure if 10 year olds continue to join social media at the rate they have done so in the past.
It’s not likely to get 15 year olds who have been addicted for 5 years off it, anymore than smoking bans have any impact on teens who have been smoking or vaping for years.
I've said this to every single person who pushed for this.
"Imagine you're a teenager, and your parents and government tell you to not do something... What will happen?"
The answer is of course that they keep doing it anyhow. But hide it.
As an Aussie, and a parent. What I wanted was that the government mandate that in order for your website or app to launch in Australia, that if you want to allow kids between certain ages on the website/app. Then you need to have robust parental controls. Create family accounts where you can link parents and children, share whatever tracking/tracing you have with said parents and make it as good as you can. Mandate specific minimum controls based on what kind of type of app/website it is.
Put the control in the hands of the parents, and not this stupid one size fits all approach.
Banning social media for kids before banning junk food for kids when you have a childhood obesity/health crisis just shows which companies greased the hands that made the laws
Perhaps one can dream that we have a social media ban that affects HN and bans 35 and below. One can imagine if a ban is successful on one site then the kids flood another. It’ll be some kind of Thundering Herd Eternal September.
When we give everyone a computer and want to restrict a group of people from some of its capabilities (for their own good), the consequence is a restricted computer. Not giving everyone that computer in the first place could help ensure it stays a true general purpose computer.
Instead of mandates, why not lower the tax burden on citizens. That would give move freedom to parents to decide not to work, and actually, parent their kids.
Don't force parents to both be absent from home because the burden of the bureaucracy salaries is too great without sucking blood from the middle class
Houses don't need to cost 0.5M AUD with long mortgages that force 2 parents to work. They cost that because the government is spending like a drunken sailor and destroying the value of money held by everyday australians.
This is pathetic, it is like saying anti smoking laws failed because within a few months teens were still smoking. This is a generational change. No sane person ever expected teens already using social media would stop using social media. It is the next cohort that it is going to make a difference to.
I expect better from Reuters than to be the propaganda mouthpiece of social media platforms.
Parent of a Year 7 kid here (that's the first year of high school and a very common age at which all kids have phones).
The social media ban has been a wild success in preventing 11-year-olds having their social connections locked into the major social media platforms. Prior to the ban, if you weren't on insta you weren't connected. Now my kid talks to other kids on the phone or sends SMS, but also doesn't really stay in constant contact with their peers outside of school hours, they do their own thing or organise socialising themselves.
It's been hugely positive for interrupting the hostile social media companies from hijacking kids' social connections for the purpose of addictive algorithms to drive ad revenue.
From what I hear, once social media use is embedded in the older teenagers, they are all working around the ban very easily. The social media companies have made no real effort to enforce the ban or comply at anything more than a minimum level, and I wouldn't expect them to as they have absolutely no concept of social licence.
It's beautiful to see civil society take back one little bit of freedom from psychopathic oligarchs.
19 comments
[ 0.24 ms ] story [ 7.4 ms ] threadIt will be a failure if 10 year olds continue to join social media at the rate they have done so in the past.
It’s not likely to get 15 year olds who have been addicted for 5 years off it, anymore than smoking bans have any impact on teens who have been smoking or vaping for years.
"Imagine you're a teenager, and your parents and government tell you to not do something... What will happen?"
The answer is of course that they keep doing it anyhow. But hide it.
As an Aussie, and a parent. What I wanted was that the government mandate that in order for your website or app to launch in Australia, that if you want to allow kids between certain ages on the website/app. Then you need to have robust parental controls. Create family accounts where you can link parents and children, share whatever tracking/tracing you have with said parents and make it as good as you can. Mandate specific minimum controls based on what kind of type of app/website it is.
Put the control in the hands of the parents, and not this stupid one size fits all approach.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childhood_obesity_in_Australia
The media is predictably unhappy since they lose eyeballs, advertising revenue and money.
Previous approaches like expecting parents to educate children failed miserably.
Most parents lacked at least one or more of motivation, time or knowledge.
Did you read what the article said?
> parental awareness of their [children] online habits had actually declined.
From that perspective, it's even worse now.
Instead of mandates, why not lower the tax burden on citizens. That would give move freedom to parents to decide not to work, and actually, parent their kids.
Don't force parents to both be absent from home because the burden of the bureaucracy salaries is too great without sucking blood from the middle class
Houses don't need to cost 0.5M AUD with long mortgages that force 2 parents to work. They cost that because the government is spending like a drunken sailor and destroying the value of money held by everyday australians.
I expect better from Reuters than to be the propaganda mouthpiece of social media platforms.
The social media ban has been a wild success in preventing 11-year-olds having their social connections locked into the major social media platforms. Prior to the ban, if you weren't on insta you weren't connected. Now my kid talks to other kids on the phone or sends SMS, but also doesn't really stay in constant contact with their peers outside of school hours, they do their own thing or organise socialising themselves.
It's been hugely positive for interrupting the hostile social media companies from hijacking kids' social connections for the purpose of addictive algorithms to drive ad revenue.
From what I hear, once social media use is embedded in the older teenagers, they are all working around the ban very easily. The social media companies have made no real effort to enforce the ban or comply at anything more than a minimum level, and I wouldn't expect them to as they have absolutely no concept of social licence.
It's beautiful to see civil society take back one little bit of freedom from psychopathic oligarchs.