I don't believe it's something for the government to enforce. Any law that requires a nongovernment agency to collect identification means that identification is at risk of being stollen and means it will be used to track the person. If every person using the internet will have to prove their age everywhere, it's going to be a mess.

Whatever company has the worst security will have all the IDs stollen and used everywhere else. And I'm sure at first, it will be used so that criminals can frame others for their online crimes really easily.

I mean how do you prove the person using the internet is the one in the ID over the internet. It's easy enough to just use the picture on the ID and some "AI" to produce a fake image if they're going to require taking a picture of who's using it or something like that. This won't stop any minors from accessing information they shouldn't. The only way to do that is through education to make them realize they don't want to access that information and then give them the tools to avoid it. Not try to keep it from them. That just makes them want it more and to have to become criminals to do it. And further, if they're committing that minor crime just to do something normal it desensitizes them to more serious crimes because they don't understand the reasoning for them. Which is why making minor stuff that doesn't affect anyone but the offender a crime is always a bad idea.

Email is social media. Zoom is social media. Suicide hotlines are social media. Kids absolutely need social media. Communication is a human right. Taking away the right to communicate means isolating children from support. How's this supposed to go for depressed, neurodivergent, or queer kids. This law gives abusive parents more control over their victims.

I mean, you can't really do it without parents.

But there could be a law that any phone tied to a number a minor possesses is locked down so it can't install the apps. It wouldn't stop web based, but apps seem to be a worse problem for various reasons.

It's not even so much the content that's the problem, it's the delivery mechanism, how it effects dopamine release, and how damaging those changes can be to a developing brain.

Its similar to the lootbox system that was regulated in various countries. Human brains will keep trying the next item in their feed because there's a chance something good shows up. If every post was good it would actually cause less addiction.

But a child has shit tier impulse control. They'll going to keep pulling the proverbial level forever, wading thru shit for the slightest dopamine hit. All the meanwhile still being influenced by what they scroll past.

Yes, but leave them the SMSs

Should anyone use social media as it exists today? Is it really social media anymore? Does that mask really cover all the horribleness

I think kids should be aborted