[HN Gopher] Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big...
___________________________________________________________________
Unsealed court documents show teen addiction was big tech's "top
priority"
Author : Shamar
Score : 230 points
Date : 2026-02-05 18:00 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (techoversight.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (techoversight.org)
| Shamar wrote:
| The documents provide smoking-gun evidence that Meta, Google,
| Snap, and TikTok all purposefully designed their social media
| products to addict children and teens with no regard for known
| harms to their wellbeing, and how that mass youth addiction was
| core to the companies' business models. The documents contain
| internal discussions among company employees, presentations from
| internal meetings, expert testimony, and evidence of Big Tech
| coordination with tech-funded groups, including the National
| Parent Teachers Association (PTA) and Family Online Safety
| Institute (FOSI), in attempts to control the narrative in
| response to concerned parents.
|
| "These unsealed documents prove Big Tech has been gaslighting and
| lying to the public for years
| mahirsaid wrote:
| Are people surprised by this. Clearly this was a tactic widely
| used in the tech industry. Their aim is to keep people on the
| platform specifically teens. Why else would you need curated
| algorithms for users.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| Anyone paying attention knew. A smoking gun means that legal
| action is possible. Or it would be in a better time.
| lostlogin wrote:
| It might, but would that achieve much? Tobacco has done ok.
| jmcgough wrote:
| Tobacco paid billions of dollars, and we've heavily
| restricted where it can be used, where it can be
| advertised, and who can buy it.
| ludicrousdispla wrote:
| Companies don't necessarily have to suffer when
| restrictions are placed on them.
|
| Ask any educator what the biggest positive change was to
| U.S. high schools in the 1970s and they'll probably
| answer that it was the ban on smoking in schools.
|
| I expect a similar response in the future regarding bans
| on social media.
| mahirsaid wrote:
| I can only imagine what it's like right now in schools. I
| can't see how anybody arguing the point that student are
| allowed to use social media in school is an okay
| activity. I know there are some countries banning the use
| of such activities in Europe and some others i can't
| think of right now.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| Algorithmicly personalized social media becoming as
| stigmatized as smoking would be an amazing outcome, and
| is a great goal for regulators.
| mahirsaid wrote:
| Indeed, I've been paying attention to the market share of
| the biggest companies in advertisement, its clear that
| Google and Meta are the largest share by a large margin.
| Almost not even comparable to other players other than
| Reddit recently. which it's exposure is dependent on Search
| engines like Google and Bing for that matter. users within
| the platform are a different story. I personally think the
| internet is not being utilized wisely when it comes to
| current context. There is still so much to be done and
| innovated and there are gate keepers keeping this from
| happening.
| hansvm wrote:
| How did that work mechanically though? At YT we were banned
| from doing basically anything with pre-18yo data, even if we
| only suspected they might possibly not be an adult -- no A/B
| tests, no ML, no ad targeting, no nada. Did leadership design a
| system where those sorts of things would happen anyway? Were
| there just enough rogue teams to cause problems?
| jacquesm wrote:
| Because the product is made to appeal to that particular
| demographic. The data doesn't really matter if you have that
| kind of reach.
| iwontberude wrote:
| For business, government, and religion: achieving scale and
| centralization necessarily leads to corrupt outcomes. This is
| also where Marx's legitimate criticisms of capitalism turn
| into a solution which is essentially its doppelganger, a
| scaled system of corruption with absolute authority with the
| rhetorical veneer of democracy.
| worik wrote:
| > At YT we were banned from doing basically anything with
| pre-18yo data
|
| I guess things are different at Google now.
| sagacity wrote:
| It's good to see that many countries are working on lesiglation
| to protect children and teens against this, since the companies
| clearly aren't trying.
| idontwantthis wrote:
| That's pretty much the whole purpose of government and if it
| isn't doing that then it has abdicated its primary
| responsibility.
| akramachamarei wrote:
| I think many people would disagree with you that the primary
| responsibility of government is to protect people from
| themselves.
| idontwantthis wrote:
| I'm talking about protecting people from evil actors with
| immense power to do harm.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| American tech corps act like cigarette companies but we're
| still at the point where banning them for kids is considered
| weird, fringe and even dangerous. Crazy.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The general problem is that nobody actually needs cigarettes
| but communication is fundamental to the human experience. How
| do you even propose to define "social media" in a way that
| can distinguish between it and any other public forum for
| discussion?
|
| The actual problem is not that kids are using group
| communications technology, it's that the network effect in
| public interaction has been captured by private companies
| with a perverse incentive to maximize engagement.
|
| That's just as much of a problem for adults as for teenagers
| and the solution doesn't look anything like "ban people from
| using this category of thing" and instead looks something
| like "require interoperability/federation" so there isn't a
| central middle man sitting on the chokepoint who makes more
| money the more time people waste using the service.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > but communication is fundamental to the human experience.
|
| Humans survived well before the internet, the telephone,
| the telegraph, or even international post.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| In those days they did this by having _physical_ public
| spaces for interaction, which we 've since priced people
| out of through artificial scarcity of real estate via
| zoning laws. And even if people were _willing_ to solve
| that one, it would take time to actually build new
| buildings, and doing that would have to be done _first_.
|
| It's also assuming that we're willing to abandon a
| technological capacity (not having to personally travel
| to someone's location to communicate with them) that
| humans have had since before Moses came down from the
| mountain, which seems like a fairly silly constraint to
| impose when there are obviously better alternatives
| available.
| pinnochio wrote:
| > In those days they did this by having physical public
| spaces for interaction, which we've since priced people
| out of through artificial scarcity of real estate via
| zoning laws.
|
| IDK where to begin with this, because we clearly do have
| physical public spaces for interaction, whether free like
| parks or not free like coffee shops. People also hang out
| at each others' homes. Moreover, supply of public spaces
| increases when there's demand, much of which is being
| soaked up by social media.
|
| You're also acting like we can't meaningfully distinguish
| between social media and other forms of communication and
| that we have to be all or nothing about it, which is a
| bewildering take. Even social media can be meaningfully
| distinguished in terms of design features. Facebook back
| when it was posting on friends' walls, no likes,
| comments, shares, friend/follower counts, or feeds, was
| fun and mostly harmless. LinkedIn was genuinely useful
| when the feed was nothing more than professional updates.
| They've all since morphed into toxic cesspools of social
| comparison, parasociality, polarization, disinformation,
| and other problems. Interoperability/federation doesn't
| solve those problems: most of the interoperable and
| federated solutions actually perpetuate them, because the
| problematic design features are part of the spec.
| dylan604 wrote:
| At least they are not running commercials saying 9 out of 10
| doctors agree social media is good for you. That's the best
| thing I can say about them.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Ha, true. But I wouldn't put it past them if it ever gets
| to the point where they genuinely feel threatened.
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| if social media trends * related data suggested it would
| work they'd totally do it
| uniq7 wrote:
| The problem is when government's solutions go through
| identifying everyone and collaterally tracking their actions.
|
| In the same way parents can be blamed for not keeping their
| children safe around guns/alcohol/drugs, they should also be
| blamed for not keeping the children out of digital dangers, and
| keep mandatory age verifications out of here.
| ares623 wrote:
| Problem is that social media doesn't have negative
| connotations like guns/alcohol/drugs do. That makes it hard
| or impossible for individual parents to restrict it. They are
| perceived as crazy or paranoid or controlling. Plus if their
| child does opt out of social media, they become a social
| outcast from their peers who are still on it, which is a
| worse outcome for the child.
|
| It almost sounds like multiple parents from a large number of
| households need to collectively act in unison to address the
| problem effectively. Hmm collective action, that sounds
| familiar. I wonder if there's a way to enforce such a
| collective action?
|
| To be clear, I do agree that putting the ban on the
| software/platform side is the wrong approach. The ban should
| be on the physical hardware, similar to how
| guns/alcohol/tobacco which are all physical objects. But I
| don't have the luxury to let perfect be the enemy of close
| enough.
| rightbyte wrote:
| > Plus if their child does opt out of social media, they
| become a social outcast from their peers who are still on
| it, which is a worse outcome for the child.
|
| I don't think that is the case any more since social media
| isn't social like it used to be?
| sagacity wrote:
| This is like saying parents are at fault when a gun salesman
| sells a weapon to their 12 year old.
| ares623 wrote:
| Not even "sell" but "give for free, constantly, every day,
| delivered directly to their house, disguised as a toy"
| uniq7 wrote:
| More like saying parents are at fault when a gun salesman
| enters their home every day, talks for hours with their
| children, and sells them weapons.
|
| Have these parents tried to not let the salesman in?
| sagacity wrote:
| Your argument is conflating smart phones with social
| media apps _and_ you seem to be assuming that kids wouldn
| 't have access to their phone in other locations where
| they are unsupervised, subject to peer pressure, etc.
|
| The "just say no" argument, basically.
| uniq7 wrote:
| Devices and networks can be configured with parental
| controls, and the blockage doesn't need to be 100%
| effective. The kid accessing Facebook from a friend's
| phone 15 mins a day is tolerable, while giving them
| access to drugs or a gun 15 mins a day is not.
|
| There is also the education part that for some reason we
| are ignoring. Kids are going to be able to access drugs
| in locations where they are unsupervised, they are going
| to be subject to peer pressure, etc. The job of the
| parents is to prepare them for that, as they should
| prepare them for the negative effects of social media.
| rightbyte wrote:
| The salesman is at their friends place. And is a
| prerequisite for soccer team meetups. Etc. You need most
| parents to cooperate to bar him... but yeah I guess being
| prudent at home helps.
| uniq7 wrote:
| I totally understand that "the salesman" is everywhere
| and that a single person can't fight against that, but he
| is everywhere because most parents are not blocking him
| in the first place, and that's exactly my point. Those
| are the parents that need to be blamed.
|
| In my first message I was not targeting those parents who
| try to block this but can't; I was targeting those
| parents that use Youtube to distract their kids since
| they are babies, those who give unrestricted access with
| no control at all, those who don't care. We all know
| people like that.
|
| This is just an hypothesis, but if parents were fined
| every time their kid accessed social media, I'm sure most
| kids wouldn't be on it.
| program_whiz wrote:
| This is a surprising take. So you know that this gun
| salesman is targeting the youth, and that parents can
| only resolve it by massive collective action, but they
| are to blame, and the gun salesman should be allowed to
| continue on his merry way?
|
| Do you think a crack dealer should be allowed to hang
| around on the playground and every kid has to talk to him
| too (and its up to parents to make sure the kids know not
| to buy his stuff)?
| akramachamarei wrote:
| Very shocking that you're being downvoted on HackerNews of
| all places, where I'd expect people to be tech-literate and
| aware of the harms of internet age verification law etc.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| I downvoted it because he invoked the analogy of alcohol
| and tobacco while simultaneously arguing that it should be
| totally on the parents. That's not how it's done for
| alcohol and tobacco! If that were true then any shop could
| sell booze and cigs to kids, and if that were the case then
| how could parents possibly hope to stop it?
|
| The premise that parenting is wholly on the parents and
| society at large doesn't need to play any role in raising
| kids is a manifestation of the kind of libertarianism that
| appeals to techies on the spectrum who want to find the
| simplest possible ruleset for everything, but it just
| doesn't work that way in reality.
| uniq7 wrote:
| Age verification for alcohol/tobacco doesn't require full
| identification nor keeps any records that can be later
| used for tracking people for other perverse purposes.
|
| I didn't say that "parenting is wholly on the parents",
| that's a straw man argument. I said that parents who
| don't keep their children away from digital dangers
| should be blamed.
|
| Parents have a huge radius of action, they can:
|
| - Avoid using Youtube for entertaining their
| babies/toddlers.
|
| - Avoid buying tablets to their children.
|
| - If they buy them a phone, use parental control and
| restrict app usage.
|
| - Monitor what their kids do on internet.
|
| - And the most important: educate their children to
| identify dangers.
|
| Do you think a parent who does none of this shouldn't be
| blamed?
|
| I want parents to embrace responsibility and act as
| parents. Delegating this kind of education to government
| is dangerous and has many negative collateral effects we
| will pay sooner or later.
| program_whiz wrote:
| Yes, to uniq7 and others -- you keep saying "identity
| verification will be used for nefarious purposes". Lets
| take the alcohol and tobacco case, was it used for
| nefarious purposes? Did adults suddenly lose rights
| and/or have something bad happen to them?
|
| The government can and does already track whatever they
| want about you. Businesses already track you unless you
| are extremely thorough about erasing your footprint.
| Adding a zero-knowledge proof through a trusted system
| that you are 18+ doesn't seem like the mountain people
| are claiming. You already have to provide ID and credit
| card to get ISP access, the byte patterns are traced back
| to your household. They already have a unique fingerprint
| on your browser and computer. The real harm is just the
| obvious encroachment that we can all see and have known
| about since early 2000s. They don't need a "backdoor", it
| feels like alarmism over a possible problem, when there
| is a very real harm to children and teens (suicide rates,
| depression, bullying, mental health, etc).
|
| to go back to smoking / alcohol / guns, one could argue
| it is an infringement, but ultimately it does seem to
| have been the right choice for society at large, and the
| increased "invasion of privacy" has been pretty minor. If
| anything, the opt-in stuff like credit cards, cell
| phones, GPS, car apps, streaming services have all been
| far larger invasions of privacy that people willingly
| embrace.
| uniq7 wrote:
| Age verification for alcohol/tobacco doesn't require full
| identification nor keeps any records that can be later
| used for tracking people for other perverse purposes.
|
| Also, the fact that gov and companies are already
| tracking people doesn't mean we should consent to more
| ways of tracking.
| miltonlost wrote:
| I hope that all the engineers who went along with this are able
| to sleep well with their stock options.
| sharts wrote:
| This is obvious for anyone that understands sales and marketing.
| The real question isn't whether this was true--the question is
| why does anyone expect this revelation would change anything?
|
| They made their wealth. They bought their politicians. In the
| worst possible case for them they would pay some fee that amounts
| to absolutely nothing making a dent in their personal day to day
| lives as a consequence of their actions.
|
| It's the cost of doing business these days. Do the wrong thing so
| long as you make more than enough money to cover the penalty fee.
|
| Nothing to see here.
| worik wrote:
| > In the worst possible case for them they would pay some fee
| that amounts to absolutely nothing making a dent in their
| personal day to day lives as a consequence of their actions.
|
| Probably, not definitely
|
| It would be possible to put the executives in jail.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > It would be possible to put the executives in jail.
|
| In what universe would this be possible?
| NickC25 wrote:
| Possibly, yes, but those executives have enough money to cut
| a deal to not only stay out of jail, but to also fund the re-
| election campaign for the DA + prosecution team, and to also
| give a job to the prosecutor's cousin, sibling, and/or in-
| law.
| soco wrote:
| Based on the aggressive reactions all across the billionaire
| board toward the European wrist-slap initiative, I would guess
| Europe is moving in the correct direction with it and the slaps
| would correctly hurt.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| I fully expect this to get ignored like all the other similar
| revelations. Heads should roll, literally, but nothing will
| happen. Does anybody have any earnest hope for reform? Even in
| Europe where the public is supposedly keyed in, and where there
| is some political traction for getting away from American
| companies, nobody seems to take the idea of banning these
| corporations seriously.
| jmusall wrote:
| I think the possibility of banning certain sites at least for
| minors is being discussed, after Australia set the precedent.
| But this of course has downsides, too, as some form of
| verification has to be implemented, that would almost certainly
| reduce anonymity and carry risks to personal data protection. A
| complete ban is unrealistic since people actually like to use
| these platforms. Plus, it would certainly entail massive
| political repercussions from the US government. This is already
| happening when US American companies are simply fined in the
| EU.
| reorder9695 wrote:
| Does that outweigh the loss of privacy involved? I really
| don't think it does personally, I should not have to show
| anyone ID to have an Instagram account, privacy and anonymity
| is a feature not a bug.
| dylan604 wrote:
| To me, the claim of privacy is the wrong concept. Anonymous
| would be a better description. People are posting things on
| a public website to be viewed by the public.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| The privacy issue is one of the reasons I favor a total
| ban.
| integralid wrote:
| The idea of banning meta or Google is indeed not serious.
| What's realistic is forcing them to behave by issuing fines
| that make such behavior prohibitively expensive. Admittedly
| there's nobody doing that in Europe seriously yet, but that's
| because the current unhinged head of American state has
| meltdown every time American bigtech get a wrist slap.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| > _What 's realistic is forcing them to behave by issuing
| fines that make such behavior prohibitively expensive._
|
| Europeans have been saying that for what, 20 years now? How
| long does it have to not work before we stop saying that it's
| a realistic solution?
| fsflover wrote:
| There were no serious attempts at enforcing the rules.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| If that's so, then is it realistic to expect that to
| somehow change? These corps have been fined more times
| than I can count, but it's clearly not working.
| fsflover wrote:
| The fines were too low. If Europe is serious now, it can
| change.
| tryauuum wrote:
| how would you ban it?
|
| I don't want the russian-style ban enforced by ISPs
|
| Probably punishing companies who pay YouTube for ads would work
| soco wrote:
| On which grounds would you punish some companies which are
| using a fully legal platform? If you had beef with the ad
| contents, you'd punish them already for that. But if you have
| beef with the platform algorithms, punish them for exactly
| that. Not over proxies! As long the algorithm was designed
| for creating dependence, than regulate that - exactly like
| you (should) regulate other substances creating dependence.
| And some countries are going exactly this way: not only
| Australia but also Finland, Spain...
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Much if not all of Europe already has ISP level bans. If they
| can use those bans against football streaming sites, why not
| Facebook?
|
| And actually I think just banning them from conducting any
| business, accepting payments/etc, would be mostly sufficient.
| They could continue to operate at a loss, but it would put
| American corps at such a disadvantage that domestic social
| media might be able to compete, and enforcing regulations
| against domestic companies should be far more feasible.
| mmooss wrote:
| Social media is being banned for minors in multiple countries,
| and more are seriously considering it.
|
| But if people keep proselytizing that nothing will happen and
| all is hopeless, it's going to be hard to get people together
| to support a change. You and others here are doing the work of
| social media companies by spreading that - on social media. In
| fact, nothing can stop the public if they want something.
| shaftway wrote:
| I feel like there are some key differences between the companies
| though.
|
| The second one outlined for Meta is:
|
| > Heavily-redacted undated internal document discussing "School
| Blasts" as a strategy for gaining more high school users (mass
| notifications sent during the school day).
|
| This sounds a lot like Meta being intentionally disruptive.
|
| The first one outlined for YouTube is:
|
| > Slidedeck on the role that YouTube's autoplay feature plays in
| "Tech Addiction" that concludes "Verdict: Autoplay could be
| potentially disrupting sleep patterns. Disabling or limiting
| Autoplay during the night could result in sleep savings."
|
| This sounds like YouTube proactively looking for solutions to a
| problem. And later on for YouTube:
|
| > Discussing efforts to improve digital well-being, particularly
| among youth. Identified three concern areas impacting users 13-24
| disproportionately: habitual heavy use, late night use, and
| unintentional use.
|
| This sounds like YouTube taking actual steps to improve the
| situation.
| jacquesm wrote:
| No, it sounds like youtube being fully aware of the
| consequences of their offering but couched in terms that allows
| them to pretend they were not. 'could' indeed.
| ares623 wrote:
| Are they taking actual steps though? Or was that letting a team
| do the work to make them feel better but never actually
| implementing it.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| > This sounds like YouTube taking actual steps to improve the
| situation.
|
| And yet here we are years later without change. So we've got
| proof that they knew this and have done nothing. Don't need to
| speculate at all.
| rafram wrote:
| No, they actually added a bedtime reminder feature for all
| users that they couldn't verify to be adults: https://www.red
| dit.com/r/youtube/comments/1pmcr04/what_the_h...
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| lol yes, every software company's answer to a problem, no
| matter how pervasive: a new setting
|
| but I guess you're right, it's a little more than nothing
| nisegami wrote:
| Not realistic to reply to all your replies re:youtube, but
| they've absolutely added some features to mitigate bedtime use
| and at least for me they were opt-out rather than opt-in.
| corranh wrote:
| With the looping TikTok-style shorts, YouTube seems to be more
| habit forming than ever.
| 1bpp wrote:
| My YouTube use definitely isn't healthy, but it's still the
| only social app that asks me to take a break if I use it too
| long or late at night. That should be standard in any of these
| apps.
| ryeights wrote:
| TikTok does this as well.
| nico wrote:
| I get those on TikTok. There's a video of someone asking if
| you've been scrolling/watching for too long and recommending
| to take a break
| iwontberude wrote:
| What country are you in? I have never seen this in the US
| although I have been a very long time subscriber to YouTube
| Premium.
| thrance wrote:
| I get it too, in France. You can disable it in the
| settings.
| miltonlost wrote:
| Earthbound even did this on the SNES back in 1994
| silverquiet wrote:
| Does it recommend taking a break? Mostly I've seen it ask if
| I'm still watching. I've always assumed this is not for user
| benefit, but in order to not spend bandwidth on a screen that
| is not being looked at.
|
| The only site I'm familiar with that has somewhat decent
| self-limiting functions built in is HN's no procrastination
| settings. But that's of course because HN isn't run to make
| money, but as a hobby.
| jhhh wrote:
| YouTube Shorts exist, which they brag about hours watched, so I
| don't think they really care about those things at all.
| probably_wrong wrote:
| > _This sounds like YouTube taking actual steps to improve the
| situation._
|
| The issue I take with statements like that is that they are
| saying one thing while doing the opposite. This document [1],
| for instance, shows that YouTube knew as early as April 2025
| that infinite feeds of short form content can "displace
| valuable activities like time with friends or sleep", but that
| hasn't stopped them from aggressively pushing YouTube shorts
| everywhere.
|
| The most charitable interpretation I can think of is that there
| are two factions, one worried about the effects of YouTube in
| teens and a second one worried about growth at all costs. And I
| don't think the first one is winning.
|
| [1]
| https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.40...
| freejazz wrote:
| >This sounds like YouTube taking actual steps to improve the
| situation.
|
| Maybe if they actually did any of those things...
| jacquesm wrote:
| All of these guys should end up behind bars. To purposefully prey
| on vulnerable kids like this, it is absolutely disgusting. And
| here I am as a parent trying to stem the floodgates against
| people wielding billions of $ and armies of programmers and
| psychologists to harm my kids. Fuck them. And if you work for
| them then...
| betaby wrote:
| Meanwhile 2 billion Coca Colas are sold per day. That's over 75
| million kgs of sugar/day - no one bats an eye.
|
| Teen/kid addiction to sugar was and is a priority.
|
| Social networks is a sugar for minds.
| shimman wrote:
| You must have been a child when Michelle Obama said that
| children needed better food and half the country lost their
| collective minds. Hard to do anything when corporations control
| what most legislation is passed.
| betaby wrote:
| > You must have been a child when Michelle Obama said
|
| My kids were born long before Obama took the office.
|
| What's your point again? That president can't control the
| quality of the food in the country under their control?
| reaperducer wrote:
| The way I read it, he takes issue with your assertion that
| "nobody bats an eye" at sugar in Coke.
|
| This is quite the opposite of everything I've ever seen in
| my entire life in America.
|
| Or perhaps since you mention sugar, not corn syrup, and
| list quantities in kilograms not pounds or tons, he
| suspects you may not actually have first-hand experience
| with this.
| betaby wrote:
| > you may not actually have first-hand experience
|
| Sigh ( in canadian )
| reaperducer wrote:
| Thank you for proving my point. Unless Obama was also
| president of Canada. I may have missed that.
| shimman wrote:
| Point is that people do in fact try to change what you're
| complaining about, your dismissive comments are just sad.
| Go out and organize rather than shouting into the void if
| this is what you care about.
| reaperducer wrote:
| I've always wondered if her initiative, which caused some big
| food companies to reduce fat and salt in their products, and
| change their frying media, is the reason for the rise of
| Sriracha in America.
|
| My theory is that the food tasted less flavorful, so people
| compensated by adding their own.
|
| I don't eat a lot of junk food, but for a long time after the
| Obama administration, when I did partake, often my immediate
| reaction was "Wow. These aren't as tasty as I remember."
|
| /I'm looking at you, Cool Ranch Doritos.
| malfist wrote:
| Can you point to any examples of big food companies
| actually making changes for Michelle Obama's campaign?
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Sisco, e.g. public school cafeterias. That's probably
| about it. The way in which school menus were actually
| changed was very misguided however.
| reaperducer wrote:
| First two results from this new-fangled thing they call a
| "search engine:"
|
| https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768807
| ?re...
|
| https://www.vox.com/2016/10/3/12866484/michelle-obama-
| childh...
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| sriracha has a ton of sugar in it, ditto for things like
| ketchup.
|
| in all likelihood it's just enshittification, as those big
| corps make more slop for the plebs to eat in the cheapest
| way possible
| antiframe wrote:
| "No one bats an eye" is a weird take when the Federal
| Government, via the Department of Health and Human Services,
| has literally just declared war on added sugar. [1] Also, lots
| of people have already changed their diets [2] regarded added
| sugar.
|
| Sugar has been vilified for longer and more vociferously than
| social media use by kids, but that may be changing now.
|
| [1]: https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2026-01-07/trump-
| admin...
|
| [2]:
| https://ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S0002-9165(23)02461-9/pdf
| tokyobreakfast wrote:
| Well the narrative has already been promulgated that they are
| "anti-science" so it's being ignored. Sugar is good. Hey Mom,
| send down more Pixie Stix!!
| antiframe wrote:
| You must run in different circles than I, most people I
| know have reduced their added sugar consumption. My point
| was that there has been a swelling wave of anti-sugar
| sentiment over the last decades and it's reach the point
| were even RFK loudly said sugar is bad. That's the opposite
| of "no one bat's an eye". Of course people will ignore all
| sorts of advice for all sorts of reasons, but the sentiment
| (as shown by the decline of added sugar consumption) is
| there, and growing.
| tokyobreakfast wrote:
| I recall a discussion here recently whereupon the list of
| items eligible for nutrition assistance (food stamps) in
| the USA were changed to exclude unhealthy foods,
| especially those with added sugar. Which BTW affects
| poorer communities disproportionately with long-term
| health problems like diabetes.
|
| Elimination of processed sugar is a good thing.
|
| Despite this, the discussion quickly pivoted to "how dare
| you keep poor children from enjoying birthday cake".
| dylan604 wrote:
| The Coke Classic is still selling. Coke Zero has not
| replaced Classic. Both "no one bat's an eye" and your use
| of "most people" (even with the "I know" qualifier) are
| clearly extremes of both sides of the conversation being
| intentionally used. The fact that things like Diet, Zero,
| etc version of Coke and other soft drinks exist show
| people are paying attention to sugar. The fact that
| sugary products are still being purchased shows that not
| everyone has changed their habits.
|
| Shouting extreme positions doesn't really move the
| conversation
| worik wrote:
| > no one bats an eye.
|
| Untrue
|
| My six year old grand child made up a food related game for me
| to play with them that involved penalties for choosing food
| with sugar.
|
| Somebody is getting to them, good
| RajT88 wrote:
| And why not? AAA game companies have been reported to have
| psychologists on staff to help make their games more addictive.
|
| We don't police big tobacco very well on making their products
| more addictive. We seem to be fine with expanding gambling -
| where I live (not Nevada!) slot machines are everywhere. Nice
| restaurants even will dedicate corners to slot machines - not
| just seedy bars. Sports betting apps are all over streaming ads,
| and their legality is expanding even though when they are
| legalized in an area the divorce and loan default rates go up
| measurably.
|
| Why would we regulate big tech if we don't bother with anything
| else?
|
| The kids are just the latest victim of a long ongoing trend.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > And why not?
|
| Because it is simply wrong.
|
| > AAA game companies have been reported to have psychologists
| on staff to help make their games more addictive. > We don't
| police big tobacco very well on making their products more
| addictive.
|
| Three wrongs don't make a right I guess.
| RajT88 wrote:
| My exact point. Our current moment seems to be us being happy
| to expand societal harms for whatever reason. I'd hazard a
| guess it's our political system getting more and more
| susceptible to lobbying money.
| michaelt wrote:
| _> Why would we regulate big tech if we don 't bother with
| anything else?_
|
| I'm pretty sure we do, in fact, ban under 18s from tobacco,
| alcohol, and real-money gambling.
| sidrag22 wrote:
| > real-money gambling
|
| this is doing a lot of heavy lifting for how loose we have
| become with under 18 questionable products.
| RajT88 wrote:
| Let's check in on how we're doing preventing the tobacco
| industry from marketing to children.
|
| Hmm, candy flavored vapes both for THC and nicotine. Teen
| psychosis from THC. Popcorn lung. Not so good it seems!
|
| https://www.lung.org/research/sotc/by-the-
| numbers/8-things-i...
| mmooss wrote:
| Just looking at the US, tobacco comes with warnings, there
| are limits on advertising (see any tobacco product
| commercials on TV?), and the manufacturers lost a lawsuit
| leading to massive fines and many of these outcomes.
|
| The idea that we don't regulate things would be shocking to
| the anti-regulation crowd, and the staffs at the FDA, FCC,
| etc.
| ghurtado wrote:
| Not to mention strict limits on advertising of these
| products, licensing required to sell them, and very highly
| taxed.
|
| If that's not enough, in the US we created a federal level
| agency that oversees 3 things only. Two of those things are
| alcohol and tobacco. And the third thing isn't even regulated
| half as much as those two.
|
| Why on earth anyone thinks these things are unregulated is
| beyond me.
| malfist wrote:
| This is defeatist. Just because something is bad doesn't mean
| we shouldn't care at all and just let everything be bad.
| helterskelter wrote:
| I know Doom Eternal had one, I believe she was even credited.
| But the line between "making a game more fun" and "making a
| game addictive" is a little blurry.
| Izikiel43 wrote:
| Addictive in this case you mean could be out of spite? Like,
| I don't like this but it's pissing me off and by god I will
| beat it?
| helterskelter wrote:
| I found the gameplay loop really fun, but the rest of it
| was definitely not up to the standard of Doom 2016.
| jackdoe wrote:
| Johnny Cash - God's Gonna Cut You Down:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJlN9jdQFSc
| guerrilla wrote:
| Awesome song. Gives me chills. Wish I believed in a just God
| like that.
| jackdoe wrote:
| you are made either of reason or of faith, but the choice
| what you are made of you can not make nor with reason nor
| with faith
|
| reason can not choose reason, and faith can not choose faith
| skirge wrote:
| "make customer come back" - every (good) car dealer
| dxuh wrote:
| I feel like this is ultimately uninteresting. This doesn't change
| anyone's image of these companies. We know they are evil. They
| have done worse and they will do worse. They never got a
| meaningful punishment and I have no reason to believe they will.
| All they get is outrage on the internet, which is effectively
| meaningless to them.
|
| The files being examined right now shows me that there is nothing
| bad enough to actually make _anything_ happen, no matter how
| absurdly evil it is. Are we too easily distracted? Or are we too
| used to inhumanity now? Or are the powerful simply more powerful
| than most of the rest of the planet?
| benoau wrote:
| Not just teens, addiction has been weaponized and monetized
| relentlessly - the whole concept of "whales" is contingent on
| fostered addiction.
| pembrook wrote:
| This reads like an Onion headline.
|
| Gosh, I hope the media never unearths the documents on my
| company.
|
| They'll learn that keeping my customers coming back was also my
| top priority. The horror!
|
| If they dig a little deeper they might uncover a vast conspiracy,
| that every business on earth has been secretly conspiring for
| decades to give people a service so good they'll come back again
| and again for it.
|
| If this isn't Pulitzer Prize winning journalism I don't know what
| is.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| > every business on earth has been secretly conspiring for
| decades to give people a service so good they'll come back
| again and again for it
|
| You're out of touch. The modern approach is to give people a
| service just barely good enough so they don't leave outright
| and keep them coming back with fomo, clickbait, and pandering
| to their worldview. I doubt user satisfaction is even a column
| in a table at social media companies.
|
| Most services I use are worse than they were 10 years ago but
| make far more money.
|
| Edit:
|
| > They'll learn that keeping my customers coming back was also
| my top priority. The horror!
|
| By the way, the customers here are _not the users_ , they're
| the _advertisers_. The users are largely disposable eyeball
| inventory.
| pembrook wrote:
| Social media is a marketplace business. Both parties are your
| customer.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| Only one party is paying anything.
| socalgal2 wrote:
| Where are the smoking guns? All I see is normal talk for how to
| get customers. A smoking gun would be "Teens love posts about X
| even though we know X is really bad for them. Let's promote lots
| of X". But I don't see any of that. I just see market research
| etc.
|
| I could post every quote on the page and respond to it how it's
| not a smoking gun but not one of them seemed like a smoking gun
| to me. Anyone care to point to one that seems like a smoking gun
| to them?
| rustystump wrote:
| We know teens love endless feeds but we know endless feeds is
| bad for them so we give them endless feeds...
| rustystump wrote:
| To be clear social media is not as clear cut bad as the
| endless news/for you feeds which are designed to keep you
| scrolling vs seeing what friends are doing
| eimrine wrote:
| Why Zuckerberg is any better than the jeevacation?
|
| Both cases makes teens as victims, both cases was a great deal
| for them but only from the first look. Both cases are piramid-
| like schemes when the victims attract new victims to keep
| benefitting from the system. Is it just like in alcohol case,
| when having too many victims justifies a bad spirit as the new
| norm?
| alamortsubite wrote:
| The "weird" thing about YouTube Shorts is no matter how many
| times you hide them (by clicking "Not Interested" or "Show fewer
| of these", however they label it), YouTube will continue to show
| them to you in your feed. I've hidden that crap 100 times and no
| doubt it'll be back soon.
| jimvdv wrote:
| I started using an extension called "social focus". Allows me
| to hide all kinds of distractions on social media and YouTube,
| can highly recommend
| CamelCaseCondo wrote:
| What I find strange about an advertising company's video
| service is that when I open my smartphone in a region with a
| different language my youtube ads also change language.
| phatfish wrote:
| Revanced YouTube app, turn off all the crap. Sometimes I open
| the official YouTube app to check my subscriptions and wonder
| how anyone uses it. If Google wasn't so ghastly and YouTube
| Premium had all the features of Revanced I would happily pay
| for it.
|
| I use the Revanced patched app logged out so Google doesn't
| decide to ban my account on a whim. Yes, one day I will dump
| Gmail, its getting closer with the state of things at the
| moment.
| commandlinefan wrote:
| This is just normal par-for-the-course business chasing an
| expanding market. Entertainment companies, in particular,
| _always_ focus on the youth market. When I was a teenager, record
| companies were obsessed with what teenagers liked: that's just
| the nature of the business. Headline is deliberately misleading.
| The (few) references in here to "addiction" are negative;
| suggesting ways to reach the youth market _without_ risking
| addictive behavior.
| buckwheatmilk wrote:
| By now I reached a point where I don't believe that big tech
| companies will do anything to improve outcomes for user if it
| will have a hit on their bottom line, and I'm sure that opposite
| is true, they will do anything to improve their bottom line even
| if it hurts the user. So it's fair to say that this relationship
| can't work in long term.
|
| I'm not really on the platforms mentioned except of YouTube, and
| it's considered to be the lesser offender here but still I can't
| avoid seeing how bad it got.
|
| I remember 2007-2012 the platform was mostly for entertainment,
| silly cat videos pranks, a low budget documentary here and there.
| 2012-2015 felt like the period where YouTube became a platform
| for more useful things, people showing how they are fixing cars,
| professors uploading their recorded classes, history channels,
| but on the sidelines people were starting to make money off doing
| weird things, like unboxing stuff on camera, drop testing phones,
| etc.
|
| If you were told in early 2000's that people will be getting
| extremely rich by unpackaging products on camera, you would have
| been called insane, no one would have considered wasting their
| free time watching things like that. It might be more difficult
| to convince older folks to engage but younger generation was
| malleable and was easy to hook, and slowly it became normal.
|
| 2015 to present days became a period where it's completely normal
| to make user to watch the ad disguised as content. People
| testing/showcasing/unboxing products or even political ideology
| propaganda presented as discussion in form of a podcast.
|
| It's obvious that the quality what is offered on YouTube has
| gotten worse, but they can counter it with autoplay, infinite
| scroll, landing page filled with eye grabbing content. The only
| way to watch things on YouTube and not be effected by this
| nonsense is to use a different client (freetube, jaybird,
| newpipe, there are plenty more). You can define of your homepage
| will look like, weather you want to see shorts or not, infinite
| feed, suggestion etc.
| takklob wrote:
| These people need to be killed.
| akramachamarei wrote:
| This is an interesting, valuable article. It should definitely be
| shared widely, especially with parents and teachers. I would love
| to see ISPs (including cell carriers) sell content control
| mechanisms to customers so parents and teachers can control at
| the internet service level how much social media their children
| and students use. I am also interested in open
| source/independent/small time developers who would seem highly
| motivated to make blocking tools and plugins for home routers and
| the like. There's a broad world of possibilities here.
|
| That said, I am _deeply disturbed_ by the authoritarians in these
| comments. Government enforced internet age verification is a
| really really bad idea. I don 't want the internet put in a
| straitjacket. I am eager to hear if someone can explain how these
| numerously proposed legislations can be done without seriously
| diminishing the freedom to be anonymous and private on the
| internet.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2026-02-05 23:01 UTC)