| The problem I've found is that enough people don't feel strongly about it. I've had plenty of conversations recently where people say "yeah, but social media is harming kids. Banning it is good". People broadly see the headline "think of the children" and think, "yup, let's protect children". To me, there's all sorts of downsides - the death of small discussion forums, pushing interesting online experiences out of the reach of teenagers, the creeping surveillance and, worst of all, the complete end of the open internet (when inevitably it doesn't actually work). But most non-tech people just don't see that. The currently in place age verificaton system is a joke. It's trivial to circumvent them - not just via VPN, but also because there's countless websites that just don't care. The social media ban will bring more of the same - and then they'll have to ban VPNs and bring in website firewalls. Who wins? The established tech companies, who have big enough legal departments to comply with increasing red tape. How is a new social network going to legitimately compete with Facebook now? But when I say all this to people I know, they just don't see it. Most people are not tech people. |
And because I don't have kids, I'm presumed to not have any skin in the game - like the websites are not going to ask me my age or something.