Technology

Another way to look at this is a back channel method of breaking down the big tech oligopoly.

I'm all for this. Kids are smart. They start using the rest of the internet. They'll become tech savvy.

This is going to harm kids.

On the upside, people who sometimes wonder if the person arguing with them is a high school sophomore won't have to wonder anymore.

As of now, there hasn't been a formal ban in Australia on social media for individuals under 16 years old, but there have been growing discussions about stricter regulations on social media usage, particularly for minors. Concerns around online safety, mental health, and privacy for young users have led to calls for platforms to enforce stricter age restrictions and introduce more safeguards for children and teenagers.

What I find intriguing is the potential for fediverse/decentralized service uptake amongst Australians, should the corporate providers decide it's too much bother implementing an identity solution for 26m people and simply rangebans them.

In an alternate universe, parents are devoting 10 per cent of their doomscrolling time to studying their router manuals and determining access windows for social media on their LAN. But why obtain a gram of education to address a serious parenting issue when a ton of democracy-threatening legislation driven by politics will achieve a quarter of the same thing?