Posted by thm 13 hours ago
How is that any different to Facebook?
In addition to TikTok, the social media company Meta, Facebook's parent company, is also under the investigation.
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...
Quoting: >The Commission is concerned that the systems of both Facebook and Instagram, including their algorithms, may stimulate behavioural addictions in children, as well as create so-called 'rabbit-hole effects'. In addition, the Commission is also concerned about age-assurance and verification methods put in place by Meta.
And before someone mentions the other? X - the everything app formally known as Twitter - is also under the Commission's scrutiny. It was fined approximately 120 million euro at the end of last year.
Once the website is designated as such, you're looked at with more scrutiny, have to comply to higher standards, and the exact remediation steps are decided on a case-by-case basis. All of the cases are chugging along, but not all of them are on the same stage.
If your website is not popular enough to be designated as VLOP, this law basically doesn't exist. It's not like GDPR in a sense that it defines some things everyone has to follow, regardless of your audience size.
Let's hope they don't chicken out.
If you now think "they have to start somewhere in prosecuting these violations" you're partly correct but also partly mistaken. Sure they have to start somewhere but they could - and if they are really serious about their claims should - have started prosecuting all those other companies which did this way before TikTok or even its predecessor Musically was a thing. Algorithm-driven endless scroll designs to keep user's eyes glued to the screen have been a thing from very early on in nearly all 'social' app-site-things and the warning signs about addictive behaviour in users have been out for many years without the law being thrown at the proprietors of those entities. As to why this has not happened I'll leave for the reader to decide. There are plenty of other examples to be found in this regard ranging from the apprehension of the Telegram CEO to the sudden fervour in going after X-formerly-known-as-Twitter which seem to point at politics being at play in deciding whether a company gets to violate laws without being prosecuted or not.
So what's the solution you ask? As far as I can see it is to keep these companies from violating user's rights by keeping them in line regardless of who owns or runs the company and regardless of whether those owners or proprietors are cooperative on other fronts. Assuming that these laws were written to stem the negative influence these app-things have on their users they should have gone after many other companies much earlier. Had they done so it might even have led to TikTok realising that their scheme would not work in the EU. They might not have launched here or they might have detuned their algorithmic user trap, they might have done many things to negate the negative effects of their product. They might just have decided to skip the whole EU market altogether like many other companies have done and do. I'd have thought 'good riddance', what you?
EU laws are slow, sometimes stupid, but consistent.
the EU isn't a federal government. the UK, when it was in the EU did a full smoking inside ban, and tightened it after leaving.
It however had a massive problem with binge drinking and sorta didn't do much to stop that, apart from make it more expensive.
the netherlands has a smoking ban, but it was brought in later (I think). they had a different drinking culture so didn't have the same issues as the UK for drink.
That kind of issue is usually left to member states.
Packaging however is more the EU's purview
i hope i don’t have to go out of my way to explain the analogy.
The World Health Organization has reached the exact opposite conclusion.
The ICD-11 doesn't include 'social media addiction.' It doesn’t exist clinically. What they did include is 'Gaming Disorder', classifying your 'sword' alongside substance abuse and gambling.
My point is governments could just as easily justify video game crack-downs with this same logic. Is that something we should be cheering on? Really?
The discussion is whether companies are treated equally with regards to a particular law.
This is Fortnite, Minecraft, Netflix, Online Shopping, Dating Apps etc.
Like, where were they years ago saying “hey TikTok, we think your design is addictive and probably illegal, you need to change or face penalties.” If TikTok continues to operate in the same manner despite a warning, sure, throw the book at them. Otherwise it just seems like the EU waits for years and years until a company is a big enough player and then retroactively decides they’ve been breaking the law for years. Doesn’t help the impression that they’re running a non-EU tech company shakedown campaign.
Tiktok spend a lot of money talking to EU regulators. They know shits coming down the track because these directives have to be put into law by eu members. that takes time.
> Doesn’t help the impression that they’re running a non-EU tech company shakedown campaign.
But thats not the point, companies shouldn't be doing stuff they know is harmful. Thats literally the point of regulation.
That is basically what happened today. No penalties have been issued at this point.
Also Commission had sent various requests for information to TikTok in 2023 before they opened these proceedings in early 2024 (https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...) - this didn't come out of the blue.
But instead you may see it as a discount on the money these companies are making from European citizens.
Lol. It's never like this.
These companies are given plenty of warnings and deadlines. After years and years of ignoring them these companies get slapped with a fine and start playing the victim.
BTW at this point DSA has been in effect for three years
The answer is "Yes".
But, when I go to Youtube - owned by Google - and use those shorts (video shorts), I kind of "swipe down". Even on my desktop computer. This is also addictive until I eventually stop.
Why isn't Google also fined? Where does the fine approach stop? I am all for punishing corporations exploiting humans, so that is all fine by me. But I don't quite understand the rationale. It is not addictive like a drug, right? The behaviour solely origins via visual feedback. That's different to e. g. taking LSD. It's a bit strange to me. When is something addictive? Where is the boundary? One could also say this is simply good design that gets people's attention. Ads are also like that. Why are ads not made illegal? I would be in favour of that. So why aren't ads made illegal? They can contain addictive elements. They manipulate the viewer. They try to sell an image. Why is that not forbidden?
Also, LSD isn't addictive in any sense of the word.
This is the classic "perfect is the enemy of the good" type scenario.
Let's make imperfect progress if that is what we're currently capable of.
Its a good thing, but its not what the title says it is
> The Commission's investigation preliminarily indicates that TikTok did not adequately assess how these addictive features could harm the physical and mental wellbeing of its users, including minors and vulnerable adults.
> For example, by constantly ‘rewarding' users with new content, certain design features of TikTok fuel the urge to keep scrolling and shift the brain of users into ‘autopilot mode'. Scientific research shows that this may lead to compulsive behaviour and reduce users' self-control.
> Additionally, in its assessment, TikTok disregarded important indicators of compulsive use of the app, such as the time that minors spend on TikTok at night, the frequency with which users open the app, and other potential indicators.
This is comically unscientific language. It's entirely subjective what is adequate when framed like that. This is another law aimed at suing megacorps to extract fines, although i m not sure how they hope to get those fines from China.
They'll spend hours with their heads down just silently looking at the thing. All desire to do anything else just vanishes. Then they freak out when you try to take it away from them.
The only obvious difference between them and someone on fent is the verticality of their posture.
I actually witness this fairly regularly. The eldest has a phone (but only allowed to use it for an hour on weekends). He immediately becomes snappy, moody and basically is just a cunt of a kid as soon as he gets sucked into the brainless shit that youtube pushes on him, whereas he has never acted that way when it came to any video game. Sure he'll complain a bit about wanting to play more, but whether that's a video game or playing football with his friends he'd be complaining anyways, and I'm sure every single child in the history of humanity has complained about not being able to play for longer. Ripping the reels away though? It genuinely feels a lot more insidious to me the effect they have on his mental wellbeing, it turns him into an actual thoughtless zombie for a while as soon as he lays his eyes on them.
And this is coming from the Uncle that was obsessed with video games when I was his age (and I still am!), I'm very happy I didn't have anything like tiktok when I was growing up and was forced to dig holes in the dirt and throw marbles at my friends instead to get my entertainment.
LinkedIn has become such a pit of force-fed self-help vitriol it’s completely lost its purpose.
I think short form content especially is basically brain rot, but I also don't know how you ban something simply because it's too good at providing content people enjoy. The result would just be a worse experience across the board, is that a win?
I guess a forced 5s video saying take a break after 20 minutes of doom scrolling wouldn't be the end of the world, but truely making it illegal doesn't make sense.
I do think it's addictive, but also the very idea of casinos/bars/opium dens in general is to keep you around.
I've never gambled let along used a gambling app.
Anything but be competitive