Mark Zuckerberg scored a major win yesterday over several state attorneys-general with the settlement of a lawsuit that claimed Meta (the holding company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatApp) deliberately programmed its algorithms to addict children to social media. The company agreed to pay a $18 billion fine (a pittance to a company that earns that in 2 weeks and which is valued at $1.5 trillion) and to set some restrictions on the use of social media by people under 18 years of age. This is hardly punishment for actions that led to numerous suicides. The company is not really being punished, which means that they have business incentives to do it again, albeit differently.
To begin, the government has failed at every turn to rein in the excesses (and they are legion) of social media companies. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 gives them immunity from being sued for what appears on their “platforms.” Unlike the New York Times, Fox News and the Encyclopedia Brittanica, Facebook can publish the most awful lies and not face punishment. The very same story on one of the three listed here would result in a massive lawsuit and pay out. This has allowed the social media companies to appeal to the very worst in humanity for a profit. It may be good business, but it is no way to run a civilization.
In the lawsuit at hand, the companies did something even more insidious. They deliberately designed their products to engage kids and keep them engaged. It was as if they put an addictive drug in a can of cola; it would boost cola sales despite harming the kid.
The attorneys-general were jubilant at their sell-out of their youngest constituency. “The focus of this case was to protect our kids: stopping notifications and alerts at night and when they are in school, encouraging them to take breaks from social media, protecting them against harmful features,” said Colorado’s attorney general, Phil Weiser, in a statement. The agreement exceeded what most courts might order, said the New York Times.
Then again, it might not. The world will never know. What the world does know is that the trial was about to get very messy and embarrassing for Meta. Mr. Zuckerberg would have to testify soon, and perjury is not a good alternative to telling the truth about the misdeeds in the complaint. The NYT said, “Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, has had to defend himself against evidence that he knew of harms caused to children. He had been expected to testify again at the trial in Oakland.” And now he won’t have to.
This journal takes the view that the social media giants (Meta, Snap, YouTube and TikTok) have abused children for years (and the settlement seems to prove that). They are really no different from Jeffrey Epstein. In all probability, they are responsible for more deaths than he was. Punishment needed to fit the crime, instead of being a traffic ticket.
Real punishment would have been a settlement on the order of $500 billion, paid by shares of stock that puts government regulators on the Board of Directors. These social media companies are monopolies in need of regulation or break up. Since Ronald Reagan, the American government has resisted these things. Let business do business is the idea. That is fine until kids start killing themselves.
There is a segment of society that will blame the dead kids for their own deaths. They are the same people who believe a dead junkie had it coming. Yet at the same time, they would blame the dealer for selling drugs because it is illegal. Meta has admitted, morally if not legally, that is is dealing.
If the idea is to make sure this never happens again, the settlement is a massive failure. The principle that underlies the settlement is “kids will be protected” against these very specific threats, but in general, they remain fair game.
When the kids needed them, the state AGs failed them.