[vineyardmike]

> Expecting any internet service can tell whether a child is currently using any given account is ridiculous without serious data collection and privacy violations.

There is the concept of "best effort" where if your customer lies to you, not much you can do. But eg. social media is popular among < 18yos. You can make an account and use it if you're young, but you get different feature flags. This is pretty common. Eg. You can use FB if you're less than 21, but no one can show you alcohol ads (fb enforces). So someone would have to actively lie to get an "algorithm" and they'd have to know they want it.

TLDR. Not crazy.

[IceMetalPunk]

> So someone would have to actively lie to get an "algorithm" and they'd have to know they want it.

You mean like... many, many kids do when they sign up for any internet account, because they know their options will be restricted if they don't?

Hell, I did it when I was 12 in the early 2000s, I guarantee children who grew up in the social media age definitely do it all the time. It's not that they "want the algorithm" explicitly, they just don't want the restrictions that they know come with telling a website "I am a child".