[Frieren]

> good luck forcing Meta

When I was a kid there were fines for factories that polluted water. Most of the time they were not found out, and when they did they just paid the fine that it was cheaper than to solve the problem.

Regulations changed, factories that polluted water got closed until they fixed the problem. Most factory owners fear the regulation, they are extremely pro-active to avoid breaking the law because the consequences are not worth it. (This trend reversed a decade ago when punishments started to be less harsh and government became more pro-business using the euphemism for corrupt)

It is possible to reign in Meta. Parents should be angry enough to bring governments down for letting tech treat their children as products. When citizens are angry change happens and becomes unavoidable.

[xoac]

Exactly. If social media apps had a configurable old style non-algorithmic feed the problem would be dramatically smaller.

[Symbiote]

With FBPurity: https://www.fbpurity.com/ I have Facebook on my desktop computer exactly as it used to be in the 2000s when I signed up: content only from my "friends" and a few chosen sources (a band I like etc).

The newsfeed is very slow to load, as to fill the screen the extension must make twenty plus requests while hiding 99% of what Facebook's addiction machine returns.

[intended]

People prefer the more engaging option, based on testing when preferences are offered.

You aren’t really putting a fair choice here. A product that is tested and refined to be viscerally attractive to our brains, vs will power.

This means you have the illusion of individual choice, with practical addiction at scale.