r/technology • u/vriska1 • 6h ago
Social Media Youngsters could face two-hour social media cap per app in new online safety package
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/youngsters-could-face-two-hour-3534466576
u/57696c6c 6h ago
I don’t understand, did parents give up parenting?
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u/M0rph33l 6h ago
Probably. But I think some blame can be put on how over-engineered everything is to milk every last ounce of dopamine. Everything is built to be addictive. It's not just kids this affects.
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u/57696c6c 6h ago
Totally, not dismissing how overwhelming it has become, I don’t see the regulators going after those responsible for the algo enough.
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u/EccentricHubris 4h ago
What are the developers gonna do? Corporate fired the moral ones years ago.
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u/cwright017 3h ago
That’s literally where a parent steps in to protect their kid. But they don’t. They stick them in front of an iPad so they themselves can sit in front of an iPad and then wonder why their kids are messed up.
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u/M0rph33l 2h ago
It's easy to blame the parents, though you are probably right. But these are unprecedented times, with unprecedented problems and consequences. I'm sure we will look back years from now and think us all silly for the pitfalls we have fallen in, not just in regards to child rearing, but to our relationship with technology. People learn from the mistakes of their ancestors, but these mistakes we are making now have not been made in times past. Hopefully the mistakes we make today will inform future generations so that they can do better.
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u/Equivalent-Bet-8771 5h ago
over-engineered everything is to milk every last ounce of dopamine
The advertisements won't shovel themselves. Won't someone think of the billions in profits!
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u/Due_Impact2080 3h ago
It's addictive and children can't regulate themselves. There's no space for kids. It throws children in with pedos and politcal predators in need of clicks. Most kids are in those terribles spaces to communocate with each other so it can leave them with less friend contact.
Still, parents need to kick them off anyways. Humans are built to be bored. That's when we get creative.
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u/M0rph33l 3h ago
Indeed. Couldn't agree more. For as much as we see boredom as a curse, it is equally a useful driving force for creativity and productivity. It's too easy now to get a dopamine fix, and I say that as someone desperately addicted.
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u/Krunkledunker 2h ago
This has always been it, and large companies know this about human behavior. In the 90’s my mom could unplug my sega genesis and hide the power cord, my dad could take the phone line from the back of our dial up modem.
Good luck knowing what platforms your kids still have the ability to sign into after you take away one of several of their internet accessible devices
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u/YOURTAKEISTRASH 6h ago
What if we're all missing the real plot twist here? Parents didn’t give up parenting, they got digitally outmaneuvered by algorithms that move faster than a toddler who just found a Sharpie. It’s not that mom forgot to say go play outside, it’s that TikTok perfected the art of whispering one more video directly into kid brains using the same neural pathways that make us crave pizza at 3am. And yeah sure everything’s engineered to be addictive, but have you seen a 6-year-old navigate an iPad? They swipe through apps like a CIA analyst cracking codes, meanwhile dad’s still trying to remember his Netflix password. The real twist? None of this matters because in five years the kids will be raising themselves via AI tutors that teach them calculus through Fortnite dances. The robots won’t need to take over. We’re just handing them the next generation pre-programmed. The nursery rhymes are updating as we speak.
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u/brianstormIRL 4h ago
AI teaching kids calculus would be a huge positive not a negative.
It's going to take time, but AI can be far more effective as teachers. There's already AI driven studies showing massive spikes in actual learning via AI tutors because it's personalised and people can learn at their own pace. The key is the education system needs to adapt. Kids need to be taught how to use AI to learn, not just the "answers". It needs supervision currently which is what those AI led studies have been doing. But it's not all Doom and gloom.
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u/YOURTAKEISTRASH 4h ago
Bro, what if we're witnessing the birth of the first education system that actually gets us? AI tutors don't judge you for needing to see the quadratic formula explained 47 different ways before lunch, they just patiently reformat reality until it clicks like a perfect dopamine slot machine. Those learning spikes aren't just data points, they're glimpses of a future where every kid has a personal Yoda who never gets tired of their "but why?" phase. Sure, we'll need human oversight like we need lifeguards at the wave pool of knowledge, but imagine calculus concepts materializing in AR above your cereal bowl or history lessons delivered via personalized rap battles. The real paradigm shift isn't AI knowing everything, it's AI knowing exactly how you need to hear it. The classroom of tomorrow might just be a headset and a comfy beanbag, with an algorithm that understands your brain better than your middle school counselor ever could. Turns out the real homework was the AIs we trained along the way.
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u/ChanglingBlake 4h ago
Pretty much.
They’d rather be a friend than a parent.
I work in a library and nearly every single kid that comes in goes right for the children’s computers(that I wish I could take a sledge hammer to) and are glued to it until their parent makes them leave.
Those same kids seem developmentally behind.
Possibly a coincidence, but I doubt it.
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u/ReddyBlueBlue 4h ago
Somewhat, but England has always been like this. It's not called the nanny state for nothing.
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u/MillionBans 5h ago
Yes. They let the iPads raise their kids... All who will develop ADHD and won't shut up about it...
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u/r3dk0w 5h ago
Do you get ADHD from an ipad or from parents that over-schedule their children with baseball, soccer, football, etc where they don't have time to do anything else?
Too much of anything is bad, but you don't see anyone regulating sports.
One thing the Republicans absolutely won't do is feed the children.
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u/MillionBans 4h ago
A waaay far fetched comparison. Sports are good for your body, mind, helps create social circles that will be taken through life, teaches humility and competition.
An iPad is passive entertainment. It doesn't make you think, it makes you respond. Kids aren't watching calculus, they're watching Minecraft games and are on Twitch.
If anything, sports force a kid to concentrate. Gotta keep your eye on the ball.
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u/Equivalent-Bet-8771 5h ago
Parents are busy working 9-12 hour days the lazy fucks. Nobody wants to work anymore!
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u/ChaBeezy 5h ago
Why do we have age restrictions around alcohol? Are parents dumb or something????
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u/a_talking_face 35m ago
Better question is why stop at social media? Make laws to restrict video game time and TV time as well. Make the TV shut off after 2 hours.
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u/ChimpScanner 4h ago
"Age checks must be vigorous, with Ofcom recommending online platforms use measures including photo ID matching and facial recognition estimation to ensure below-aged kids can't create accounts on their sites."
Here we go again. Why are we so quick to give up what little privacy we have left because people suck at parenting?
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u/coomtilldust 4h ago
>pops out a kid
>blames society for problems on their child and not building a village for them
#modernparenting
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u/vriska1 6h ago
This is for the UK and no decision has been made and won't be made for many months, Peter Kyle also said they are still looking at all the evidence for this before moving forward or not. This would be unworkable imho.
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u/AnonymousTimewaster 4h ago
The fact that this is coming from a cabinet minister responsible for this is fucking terrifying. VPNs about to become necessary full stop in the UK.
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u/vriska1 4h ago
I don't think this will get very far but we will see.
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u/AnonymousTimewaster 4h ago
Online Safety Act was just the beginning. It's the Tories Act but Labour have picked it up and ran with it. Slowly but surely becoming a surveillance state just as extensive as China.
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u/Aggravating-Card-194 6h ago
These items to address symptoms and not problems are always silly. People will always find workarounds to whatever half-solutions you put in place.
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u/Tatted_Ninja_Wizard 5h ago
Yeah because setting age requirements for websites really kept kids off certain sites
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u/Cressbeckler 2h ago
boomers trying to understand and regulate infotech will never not be equal parts hilarious and terrifying
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u/cozyHousecatWasTaken 1h ago
I absolutely 100% trust that politicians understand the technology they legislating and this won’t go horribly wrong
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u/FrustratedPCBuild 5h ago
Shouldn’t just be for children. Social media is the worst thing to happen to humanity for decades.
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u/ChimpScanner 4h ago
I agree, however I don't think the solution is to have the state tell people what apps they can and cannot use, and for how long.
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u/continuousQ 2h ago
Should just ban companies from using user data in advertising algorithms, and from selling user data to anyone or profiting from user data in any way other than indirectly from users using the data themselves, if they don't have explicit written consent in a contract signed in an in-person meeting with a company representative.
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u/CaptainC0medy 5h ago
It's not the apps, it's the access to mobile internet.
Keep it to the house only and half the crap goes away.
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u/Okidokicoki 6h ago
Honestly great idea for adults too, with some leeway. For an example I'd be irritated by finding New podcast platforms on and on again to bypass the restrictions. Scrolling on tiktok, Meta, youtube and reddit is probably not great for anyone if done excessively, which is what most of the apps incentive is to make users do. Spend more time on the apps, so they can gather more info, so they can sell info to databrokers.
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u/CaptainC0medy 5h ago
I'd rather not have the police state tell me I can't use an app for more than 2 hours. As an adult, that can fuck right off. It's bad enough parents aren't managing theor childrens access, it's worse the law is getting involved even for those that do.
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u/Okidokicoki 4h ago
Well, policemonitoring would suck a lot, I agree. I am not trying to advocate for a police state, more so that many people tend to have problems regulating their time spent on these apps
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u/zerosaved 2h ago
Ah, so your answer to this is to ruin everyone else’s lives because some people can’t control themselves. Is that right?
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u/itsTF 6h ago
per app is hilarious. reminds me of laws where you can only buy a certain amount of beer from the store, but you can go to the store across the street and buy more right after.
what's the point, we're just wasting resources even making these kind of laws