The fact that they’re willing to pay teenagers to keep quiet says a lot. If the apps were really as safe as they claim, you’d think they’d want to prove it in court rather than settle quietly. Hard to take all those speeches about protecting kids seriously after that.
It also shows what’s at stake for them- what they have to lose. A billion dollar company doesn’t write $2MM checks to teenagers on a whim. Someone did the math, and decided that whatever those kids had to say would cost Meta more than paying them all off.
I think it boils down to this- Meta makes money through engagement algorithms. They keep you scrolling and scrolling for hours, and the longer you scroll the more ads you see. And the more people are scrolling, the more people there are on the platform as a target audience so the more creators are on the platform.
But that comes at a cost. Not for Meta, but for the young impressionable people that get sucked into endless scrolling and believing that the fake lifestyles and appearance of ‘influencers’ are the way to be happy.
Meanwhile there is no downvote button. So the worst of the toxic crap gets seen by everybody and of course people react to it and call those people out but as far as Meta is concerned that’s just more engagement on their platform.
Point is, they have to know this is happening. They aren’t stupid. And if they know they are causing harm to kids and keep doing it anyway, then they are in big big big big big trouble. Either through court judgments or additional regulation.
And so if they can stop that from happening by writing a few million dollar checks, that’s a bargain.
Read Careless People by Sarah from Meta/Facebook. She paints a picture where they are ran by people who are clearly sociopaths (obvious), but she mentions how none of them let their children use the very products they built/build. They go to Montessori schools and use nothing but wood toys from what I remember hearing.
The fact that they’re willing to pay teenagers to keep quiet says a lot. If the apps were really as safe as they claim, you’d think they’d want to prove it in court rather than settle quietly. Hard to take all those speeches about protecting kids seriously after that.
It also shows what’s at stake for them- what they have to lose. A billion dollar company doesn’t write $2MM checks to teenagers on a whim. Someone did the math, and decided that whatever those kids had to say would cost Meta more than paying them all off.
I think it boils down to this- Meta makes money through engagement algorithms. They keep you scrolling and scrolling for hours, and the longer you scroll the more ads you see. And the more people are scrolling, the more people there are on the platform as a target audience so the more creators are on the platform.
But that comes at a cost. Not for Meta, but for the young impressionable people that get sucked into endless scrolling and believing that the fake lifestyles and appearance of ‘influencers’ are the way to be happy.
Meanwhile there is no downvote button. So the worst of the toxic crap gets seen by everybody and of course people react to it and call those people out but as far as Meta is concerned that’s just more engagement on their platform.
Point is, they have to know this is happening. They aren’t stupid. And if they know they are causing harm to kids and keep doing it anyway, then they are in big big big big big trouble. Either through court judgments or additional regulation.
And so if they can stop that from happening by writing a few million dollar checks, that’s a bargain.
Read Careless People by Sarah from Meta/Facebook. She paints a picture where they are ran by people who are clearly sociopaths (obvious), but she mentions how none of them let their children use the very products they built/build. They go to Montessori schools and use nothing but wood toys from what I remember hearing.
You took them seriously before?
Why?
Their whole business revolves around exploitation and lying. And exploitation. And lying.
That’s a bot comment
Which one - mine or yours?
Theirs. The one you replied to.
Ah, thanks!
I got fooled…