this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2026
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They’re basically minimum-viable products that by design can be used to violate the law in California when the Act goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2027.

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[–] BestBouclettes@jlai.lu 147 points 4 days ago (3 children)

By the way, the current age verification madness is a coordinated lobbying campaign by Meta

[–] EonNShadow@pawb.social 33 points 4 days ago (1 children)

One more reason for me to fucking hate Zuckerberg.

Add it to the pile at this point...

Zuckerberg and Thiel.

[–] org@lemmy.org 29 points 4 days ago (16 children)

To avoid any responsibility for them not moderating.

[–] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago (2 children)

It's more about ad revenue. Advertisers don't want to pay for bots to read their ads.

[–] tristynalxander@mander.xyz 3 points 2 days ago

Ads were always a terrible way to fund the internet.

Not to rant, but some things are so cheap or so important (or both) that it's foolish not to operate off an endowment system. The internet, journalism, science -- the information foundation of the modern world has to be independent for a stable society. Like, yeah, capitalism bad and establishing an initial investment is asking a lot of people's finances, but surely operating independently is worth it?

[–] org@lemmy.org 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Because a bot can’t report an age?

[–] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

We're talking the goal. Actually implementing it successfully is another matter entirely.

You need to be thinking beyond just this law. Once you make it mandatory for all sites to use age verification, you then pass other laws to patch the holes in the system. Look at the DMCA. They made it a felony to bypass copyright restriction technology. They could write a law making it a felony to bypass age verification tools, even if you yourself are over 18. Just like it's currently a felony to use technology to bypass copyright protection tools, even for media that you've legally purchased.

[–] org@lemmy.org 3 points 3 days ago (4 children)

I agree. This is a slippery slope. We need to assassinate each person pushing this law, and everyone who votes for it.

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[–] racoon@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 days ago

Or Zuckerberg is the ones forking the resources to comply with the wishes of the WEF and other chosen oligarchs whose God promised them OS verification thousands of years ago

[–] brokenwing@discuss.tchncs.de 22 points 4 days ago (14 children)

Wait are they planing to fine non-age verification compliant devices?

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[–] SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 37 points 4 days ago (3 children)

Can someone eli5 the idea? I don't get it, even after reading the page. But now I want one.

[–] fluffykittycat@slrpnk.net 41 points 4 days ago (1 children)

They're breaking evil age verification laws on purpose as civil disobedience with cheap hardware

[–] SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 20 points 4 days ago (1 children)

OK, the disobedience was the part I didn't get. Thank you!

[–] fluffykittycat@slrpnk.net 13 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Insofar as part availability isn't insurmountably impacted this also constitutes functional resistance to all manor of censorship and surveillance. If you can code, test on one of these

I can, but I probably won't, because my backlog is full and overflowing. But it is cheap... damn.

[–] DFX4509B@lemmy.wtf 18 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

It's protestware, which is great.

[–] SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social 10 points 4 days ago

I agree, but now I am torn because I'm protesting the US as a whole right now.

[–] jws_shadotak@sh.itjust.works 17 points 4 days ago (11 children)

California is adding a requirement for age verification for operating systems (or something like that) so each one of these violates that law by booting into linux.

[–] dan@upvote.au 15 points 4 days ago

Not just California. Several other US states are considering (or will be rolling out) similar laws, and Brazil's version has already rolled out this month.

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[–] MousePotatoDoesStuff@lemmy.world 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

What in leftist infighting hell is even happening in this comment section?

[–] Eggymatrix@sh.itjust.works 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

For some people the world is black and white, I think that law is considered bad by everyone, but for some people complaying to state regulation is a crime against humanity itself.

It is either puppies or genocide, no in-between, so adding two lines of code for json support of an age field in a systemd module warrants you to be publicly shamed, called names and probably harrassed irl.

The guy probably just wanted to be able to continue using linux at work, and without that crap he will have to go back to windows

[–] tristynalxander@mander.xyz 5 points 2 days ago (2 children)

It is either puppies or genocide, no in-between

puppy genocide?

Radical centrism

[–] Eggymatrix@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 days ago

Cool name for a band

[–] jarfil@beehaw.org 12 points 4 days ago (3 children)

AB 1043 passed the California Assembly 76–0 and the Senate 38–0. Not a single legislator voted against it.

1798.503. (a) A person that violates this title shall be subject to an injunction and liable for a civil penalty of not more than two thousand five hundred dollars ($2,500) per affected child for each negligent violation or not more than seven thousand five hundred dollars ($7,500) per affected child for each intentional violation

This device does not collect, store, or transmit the age of its user. This is intentional.

Is there any reason to believe they won't want to make an example out of intentional violators?

[–] tristynalxander@mander.xyz 3 points 2 days ago

They probably will, but I think the intentional violators are intending to make a spectacle out of it. I suspect California Voters will have it repealed in short order, but in the mean time the world should probably ruthlessly mock and isolate them.

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[–] cryptix@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 2 days ago

Why can't rest of the world just cancel California.

[–] MrSulu@lemmy.ml 14 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Brilliant. I'd like to see how the very uninformed legislators deal with this. They will have to publically re-argue first principles

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[–] msspwn@lemmy.ml 7 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Amazing. Where are the build instructions

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[–] pglpm@lemmy.ca 7 points 4 days ago

Brilliant! 💪

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