We live in a world where social media causes harm to everyone.
Yet the sites that aren’t safe are still there.
It’s a switch. It’s not that difficult.
Turn it off!
We live in a world where social media causes harm to everyone.
Yet the sites that aren’t safe are still there.
It’s a switch. It’s not that difficult.
Turn it off!
From the article:
Miss Neyland said "The law would ban young people from sharing their views online. Young People like me are the voters of tomorrow, we shouldn't be silenced"
Before there was an internet, nobody could share their views online. They shared them in real life in places like the pub or at the local church hall or community centre, and sometimes they wrote to their MP or joined a protest march.
Young people can still share their views with others in real life, it's only online where they'll have to wait until they are 16. And as they can't vote until 18 I don't really see a problem. I think it's worth it for the mental health of teenagers.
Not only do I not understand how to install it, I don't know what you mean, sorry I'm technoklutz dinosaur.
I wouldn't watch a video or programe or anything on my pooter, it's to uncomfortable and the sound is awful and my humax box dosen't have the right buttons to skip add's or anything.
I'm getting to the point where I need a new pooter as this one's getting so slow and some of hte keys don't work properly and the humax box needs replacing too I think as it's going weird and not recording some programs either at all or it stops and starts missing great chunks of program. It only seems to do it on channel 5 and more4, so I might need to retune the thing.
'm not sure why
Not sure why governments would be keeping an eye on this, not sure why the two young people are challenging it, or not sure why I would make that comment?
I don’t know all the ins and outs of social media and of the legal issues surrounding it. I have heard political commentators talking about this on programmes like “The Rest is Politics”, and I know that it is the job of most governments to make sure they are informed on major global shifts, which this potentially could be, remote though the possibility is. This sort of thing provides fodder for government speech writers and advisors to draw on and provide confidence in a political position or action, although they might or might not ensure this was discernible.
I'm not sure why. Polling shows the public in Australia supports it. It's democracy in action. Mental health of youth has been affected by it, cyber bullying is common.
Young people have trouble differentiating fact and fiction. It is why so many pressure groups target and co-opt them. They are easier to manipulate.
The internet is awash with fake and manipulated information. Bots create content. And I suspect that very little on social media is actually true. They are gossip platforms that have broad reach and amplify the fringes.
Governments have the power to change the law. If there is a gap, they can just change the law to prevent the appeal succeeding.
Whether it can be circumvented or will be effective is a different issue.
Australia is to ban social media usage for under 16's in less than 2 weeks.
2 people are challenging the law.
news.sky.com/.../teenagers-ask-judges-to-block-australias-ban-on-social-media-for-children-13475530
The government don’t actually have the power to do that unless crimes are committed. It’s hard to define actual cause and effect in some cases where there is dangerous influence, as the person watching it may already be vulnerable. TikTok or instagram are not accountable for how their users behave. But they do need to protect young and vulnerable users. And Google do not police the web as some people believe. But these big companies do bear some responsibility imo as they are the gatekeepers and can stop the flood.it always feels like they want to take it a step further in to the extreme just to make more money or users signed up then there is a new product. In the beginning of the internet it was unruly and businesses took advantage just to gain a stake, not to make it a safe space. The same is true now with the ai bubble we have, really it’s going nowhere that is conducive to human health and improvement.
Yes, there are very many unsafe sites on social media, and it is really important that people are educated in navigating these platforms safely. Unfortunately, social media platforms allow easy access for some vulnerable young people and adults who may not fully understand the risks. I see Australia is implementing a ban on social media for children under 16 years.
I use some social media sites like Twitter and BlueSky because universities and academics post really interesting links to the things I’m interested in, and it is the best way to learn about the latest developments in archaeological related areas and other interesting subjects.
Until recently, some universities only allowed access to academic papers for the select few attached to universities, although private individuals could pay exorbitant amounts of money to purchase them. Some universities have shifted to allowing open access to academic papers and they post links on social media. I stopped posting on social media years ago, but I wouldn’t like not to have access to the people I choose to follow.
How do manage to watch anything on Youtube?
I use a browser plugin called Video DownloadHelper which is free - I realise you may not understand how to install this so I'm posting this more for general information.
What it does do is adds an icon to your browser toolbar (Firefox for me at the moment) and when there is a video embedded in the page - like you get on YouTube - then when you click on the icon you can choose to download the video at whatever resolution it is offered in.
Because I work off my mobile broadband all the time and only get about 60Gb a month I find it easier to go somewhere with free wifi, go to the YouTube pages of the channels I follow and download their videos that appeal - takes few minutes each and they are saved as MP4 video files and you can watch them without the need for an internet connection, and hence have no adverts either.
It works on most other video "tube" sites that work in a similar way to YouTube.
I use Brave browser
It is an alternative to google Chrome, or Edge. (For the regular channels, I donate 1£ when I can, which is not now.)
How do manage to watch anything on Youtube? I was shown a good music video a couple of days ago and it stopped every 90 seconds for an advert, I couldn't watch it, it annoyed me so much, if I'm listening to music, I don't want some woman breaking in and asking if her dad would benefit from Tai Chi? It was so disjointed and discombobulating it almost fried my brain
I am not well-versed on it, but the Online Safety Act addresses some of your points.
There is a complex dance because governments can also be corrupted, authoritarian etc. And more data to them, can be dangerous.
There is this nice interview as well youtube.com/watch
I'd certainly like to see to see the social media better policed and these huge corporations held to account for some of the harm they cause or allow, for example I can't find a reasonable argument for child porn, for threats of exteme violence and hatred against politicians you disagree with. There's all sort of nastiness out there and it seems increasingly aimed at the young and vulnerable.
The only social media I use is here, that is my choice, I have tried or looked at other sites and I either don't like them, can't be bothered with them or find them to difficult to use. Going on to a page and instantly getting hassled by a chat bot wanting to help me, annoys the hell out of me too.
It is possible to have the internet and not use social media, although it's becoming harder as everything wants to integrate with everything else. I'm also finding the internet becoming harder to use generally, the amount of pop up's and data protection stuff that stops you even looking at a site, why can't they all have a deny all cookies option? I'ts one of the reasons I've stopped even looking at a lot of stuff. I also dislike the sort of corporate takeover or so many sites and search engines, all the sponsered ads then two or three examples of things that fit my search criteria, then more crap I didn't ask for. Or as I found when looking for a new cat scratching tree, a whole page of stuff about caring for your kitten, no cat scratching trees.
But as Stuart and others have pointed out, we have a choice about what we use, how much and when, I chose not to use social media apart from here, or messaging apps and there are certain sites I refuse to use and I'm finding the internet more and more limited in its options, or for the things I want to use it for anyway.
You reminded me that Tim Berners-Lee (aka TimBL), the inventor of the web as most of us know it, released the book "This is for Everyone" just recently. I've not bought it (nor plan to do it), but here he discusses the topic: https://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/Dysfunction.html (he is dyslexic, if you notice typos and such, that is the reason.) A key part is in that post is:
[Social Media aims to] optimize for maximum engagement.
In my view, all source code of websites should at least be open source, but should also be free (not as in gratis, but as in libre). This is what fsf, fsfe stand for. In particular, the algorithms should be free software.
You can find other TimBL posts here: https://www.w3.org/DesignIssues
I agree that social media causes harm, but it doesn't harm everyone simply because not everyone uses it. I only use this site, as it's policed well by the mods and I don't really class it as social media, I see it as a support forum.
I think that young people need more education about how social media affects them, so that they can decide how and whether to use it.
Yet the sites that aren’t safe are still there.
I think a key part here is what is considered safe.
We all have our own standards and will not want them infringed by others so you end up having an arguement over our beliefs of what is good and bad which is entirely subjective.
Where things break clear laws or rules it is much easier for the companies to act, however this will depend on who is running the company.
Take X / Twitter - Elon is allowing a lot of stuff to propogate on there because it suits his agendas while shutting down things that do not break the rules for the same reasons - and since it is incredibly hard to police a geo-distributed platform like this then the authorities have little real power over it.
The one way you do have control is whether you chose to use that platform or not. In simple terms if you don't like it, don't use it.
I try to avoid using it as I can clearly see so much rage bait being posted about subjects that I'm interested in and by studying these a bit more you can see they are being actively promoted because they generate an emotional response and are more likely to get you involved even if it is to defend your beliefs.
On balance it is quite toxic.
This site is also social media. If everything is turned off you lose a means to communicate.
People may choose what they look at. You can choose not to engage.
What it exposes is some people's true nature.
Anonymity and distance are both a help and a hindrance.
