The internet1is the latest greatest development in a long line of modern advancements in communication technology
going back to the cellphone, television, radio, the telephone, moving pictures, still photography,
and the telegraph ...the first form of digital communication.
And because humans are highly social beings,
it is no surprise that the internet has also become the way people connect and communicate
No one knows for certain when the term "Social Media" was coined, or who coined it.1
Definition of "Social Media":
forms of electronic communication (such as websites for social networking and microblogging)
through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (such as videos)
Eventually, in the wake of "The Great Dot Com Crash" of 2000,
a site that would be recognizable to today's Social Media enthusiasts as "Social Media" launched in March of 2003.
Called "Friendster", it rather quickly registered
an unprecedented 100 million plus users.1
Astute observers of Friendster recognized the significance of this accomplishment
and viewed it as a mere inkling of what could be.
One particularly astute and incredibly ambitious Friendster user recruited a few college buddies to build
and launch his own Social Media platform in 2004.
It quickly attracted millions, then hundreds of millions
and eventually billions of regularly returning, all-but-addicted users.
2
Others subsequently joined the Social Media space, among them Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube and,
most recently and most notoriously, TikTok.3
Today, nearly two decades later,
more than four and a half billion people of earth's eight billion person population engage in a little
to a lot of Social Media activity on a regular basis.1
Some much more so than others.
With maybe one exception (TikTok), all the current predominant Social Media platforms were designed for adults, not juveniles (persons under 18).
The long-time most influential Social Media platform was launched at Harvard, a university, not a high school.
Within two years, eligibility to join was expanded to include anyone with an email account and a willingness to claim to be 13 years of age or older.
As there was no process in place to verify age
high schoolers and middle schoolers were allowed to participate on what was originally an adults-only platform.
1
Apparently almost no one (except maybe Steve Jobs) imagined the day when virtually every teenager
would have a computer, a camera (still and video) and a telephone on their person
in their pocket in the form of a smartphone (iPhone introduced January 9. 2007).1
Free to range unplugged, powered by easily rechargeable ever-longer-lasting batteries,
everyone was equipped with
more communication technology than
anyone possessed in previous generations.
With virtually every teenager
connected to virtually the entire world,
it is hardly surprising that
the internet quickly proved to be
a very dangerous place
for the world's more than a billion potentially vulnerable adolescents.2
The people who designed and built the internet were incredibly competent, but not completely infallible.
In retrospect it seems they made at least one now-acknowledged mistake: allowing anonymity.
Tim Berners-Lee
--a Brit who is fairly credited with being the "inventor of the world wide web"
and who was knighted for it so apparently the Queen agreed--
has been quoted as saying with regard to Social Media that "Anonymity should not be the norm".
1
One of the first investors in Facebook, American venture capitalist Roger McNamee, termed it a mistake
to have chosen "not to require real identity" on the internet.
2
All the ensuing parade of Social Media platforms --including the aforementioned Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and TikTok--
happily emulated the practices of their predecessors and implemented lenient user identification requirements with minimal verification.1This has enabled nefarious individuals to engage with others on Social Media while maintaining anonymity simply by using easy-to-create false identities.2
Allowing this kind of anonymity on Social Media has facilitated inappropriate interactions on the internet involving teens that would be considered criminal in the
real world: adult sexual predators searching out and engaging minors,3 minors misrepresenting themselves as adults,4 and teens cyberbullying one another5 (too often resulting in the worst possible outcome),6 with girls disproportionately suffering the worst of it.7
To combat this, social media companies have rightfully closed down millions upon millions of spurious accounts over the years.8
While certainly better than taking no action, identity fraud nevertheless remains commonplace in today's social media scene.9
Thankfully, not every teen is targeted by anonymous internet sex predators or cyberbullies or foolish enough to misrepresent themself as an adult to a genuine adult.
However, every teen is exposed to an unending flow of irresistibly engaging problematic content.
Among the most insidious is that which has been enhanced1 or completely fabricated.2
This content is manufactured to falsely impress, simultaneously boosting its creator's ego while engendering envy,3 depression, jealousy, loneliness
and feelings of inadequacy among gullible and susceptible content consumers.
Peer reviewed scientific studies have concluded that for many people, particularly young people, the more time they spend on certain Social Media sites,
the worse they feel about themselves.5
In general Social Media is not good for the mental health of teenagers and is especially toxic for girls.6
The platforms (specifically Instagram and Facebook) have known this for some time, yet have persisted in continuing to refine the addictiveness of their product to young minds and profit from it.7
As if this was not bad enough, on many, if not all, social media platforms, all content is not treated equally.
Sophisticated, ever-changing algorithms surreptitiously promote certain types of content while suppressing others.1
The hows and whys this happens are not shared with the public,
but is undeniable that select "influencers" and political positions receive preferential treatment.
Additionally, there are instances where content is
purposefully
removed by employees who have the authority to interpret and enforce user rules and regulations.2
Furthermore, there have been cases where platform executives at the highest levels have collaborated with political entities in order to manipulate,
misrepresent, or suppress content potentially harmful to axs preferred brand of politics.3
Like all Social Media users of all ages, teens typically create significantly less content than they consume.
On balance this is probably a good thing, given that much of the content generated by teens is trivial at best and just as well forgotten.1Gathered up and stored away, it is certainly not material that would impress a college admissions officer,2 potential employer,3,or an older and wiser self.4Inevitably, for many adults, all the online adolescent foolishness, pranks, mischievous acts,
and casual day-to-day activities will "come home to roost".
While for most, this may only result in embarrassment, for others the consequences will be severe.5
Given the numerous challenges and obvious dangers that the current predominant Social Media platforms present for juveniles,
it should be no surprise that in-the-know parents have taken proactive measures to safeguard their children
by actively managing, severely restricting, or outright prohibiting their use of Social Media.
Old-time internet tech titans and bitter business competitors Bill Gates and Steve Jobs,
both fathers of three Gen Y or Gen Z children,
limited Social Media use and screen time in general by their offspring.\
1Next-generation tech leaders followed suit.
Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel limits his son's screen time.2Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and his wife, tennis great Serena Williams, prefer their daughter play with traditional toys rather than a smartphone.3Sundar Pichai, CEO of both Alphabet and Google, allowed his pre-teen son to mine cryptocurrency but not to have a smartphone.4
Then there is TikTok,1 the latest, greatest follow-on social media platform.2TikTok hosts short-form videos much like YouTube, and may be an exception to the aforementioned "designed for adults" rule.
TikTok is known for providing content creators with easy-to-use, highly-featured integrated video production tools,
and offering content consumers a user interface that when opened immediately begins playing an algorithmically selected video,
with another video just a swipe away, and another ad infinitum3
Especially popular among younger Americans,1 TikTok was the first social platform to achieve a significant following in the USA2 that was not developed in the USA.
A subsidiary of the Beijing-based company named "ByteDance,"3 which developed its precursor (a China-only app called "Douyin"),4 TikTok is privately held5 and partially owned by an agency of the People's Republic of China (PRC), which ultimately controls its board.6 Modified for export and launched in 2016, today TikTok is regularly used by a billion people all around the world7 but is banned in its home country the PRC.8
Many Americans other than teenagers are involved with TikTok,
but for reasons other than indulging themselves in time-wasting personal entertainment.
They are in it for the money (projected worldwide 2023 revenue 13.1 billion USD).1Businesses use TikTok to advertise for customers,2 celebrities use it for self-promotion,3and independent TikTok content creators, also known as "influencers",
earn a living on their percent of the ad revenue their videos generate.4 Additionally, investors in pursuit of the next great thing in Social Media
have acquired shares of TikTok's stock in anticipation of its value skyrocketing when it goes public.5
Comparing TikTok in the United States to its counterpart Douyin in China is both enlightening and a bit frightening.
According to American technology ethicist Tristan Harris, in China a 14 year old on Douyin will view science experiments,
museum exhibits, and patriotic and educational videos and for no more than the allowed 40 minutes per day.
Then it's back to homework and home life.
It's almost the diametric opposite of what users experience on TikTok in the United States, where they can spend unlimited hours a day.
Obviously, by its policies and practices, the Chinese government recognizes the impact Social Media has on teen development.
Mr. Harris likens the domestic Chinese version of TikTok (Douyin) to "spinach" and the version served to the USA and the rest of the world to "opium".
1
Small wonder that TikTok, banned as it is in its home country, became unprecedentedly controversial in the USA
-a country to which the PRC is an unfriendly competitor and potentially an enemy.
It is completely understandable that Americans, especially younger Americans, find TikTok engaging and entertaining, because that's what it was designed to be.1 However, unlike other social media platforms, there are genuine concerns about who ultimately controls TikTok, their true intentions, and the potential threats to the USA.2Recently, European Union regulators fined the platform 345 million euros for mishandling the personal information of juvenile users.3Even before that, President Biden banned TikTok on the mobile devices the federal government provides to employees and those of contractors,4despite $2 million invested in lobbying.5Thirty-four states have followed suit.6Declaring TikTok's country of origin a "foreign adversary", the governor of Montana signed legislation (Senate Bill 419)7 on May 17, 2023 outlawing TikTok effective January 1, 2024.
October 24, 2023: Thirty-three state attorneys general have filed suit in federal court in the Northern District of California
charging that some features of Facebook and Instagram violate consumer protection and child safety laws.
1
SUMMARY OF THE CASE
"Over the past decade, Meta
—itself and through its flagship Social Media Platforms Facebook and Instagram (its Social Media Platforms or Platforms)—
has profoundly altered the psychological and social realities of a generation of young Americans.
Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies to entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens.
Its motive is profit, and in seeking to maximize its financial gains, Meta has repeatedly misled the public about the substantial dangers of its Social Media Platforms.
It has concealed the ways in which these Platforms exploit and manipulate its most vulnerable consumers : teenagers and children.
And it has ignored the sweeping damage these Platforms have caused to the mental and physical health of our nation’s youth.
In doing so, Meta engaged in, and continues to engage in, deceptive and unlawful conduct in violation of state and federal law."
2
February 1, 2024:
Testifying before the U.S. Senate
Mark Zuckerberg
apologizes to parents of social media victims saying "I’m sorry for everything you’ve been through"
1
“I’m sorry for everything you have all been through. ... No one should go through the things that your families have suffered
and this is why we invest so much and we are going to continue doing industry-wide efforts to make sure
no one has to go through the things your families have had to suffer.”
1
February 1, 2024: A look at statewide laws and policies on cellphones in schools
1
“At least 11 states have passed laws or enacted policies that ban or restrict students’ use of cellphones in schools statewide or recommend local districts enact their own bans or restrictive policies, according to an Education Week analysis.”
1
The parade of
Social Media platforms developed and launched since 2003
were all (except maybe TikTok) developed by adults for use by adults, but somehow came to be allowed to be widely used by juveniles.
In retrospect,
it is now widely recognized that over the years
this illicit but tolerated usage
caused significant harm to the mental and physical well-being
of a generation of young people (most severely impacting girls)
of which
the platforms were fully aware.
Clearly the companies gave little consideration to mitigating the harm they knew they were causing.
Rather, it seems certain platforms were all along doing precisely the opposite:
consciously refining their "unprecedented technologies to entice, engage, and ultimately ensnare youth and teens"
in order to increase their "profit" while they intentionally "misled the public about the substantial dangers of ... Social Media".
See above SUMMARY OF THE CASE
Consequently, every day millions of American juveniles blissfully use seemingly innocuous, but actually dangerous Social Media platforms
with little or no concern about the damage they are allowing to be inflicted upon themselves individually and as a group.
Perhaps those who pioneered Social Media and achieved wealth, fame, and power while willfully damaging teens and youth should be held accountable
for the harm they have caused.
--
