I think modern social media is a huge problem but don’t see we can fix it without regulation. It’s clear that all the current incentives point companies towards engagement and rage bait and away from anything actually “social”, and I think it’s unlikely that any new social network that tries to fix these issues would achieve widespread usage.

Have any countries proposed legislation to help reign it in? What would that legislation look like? My main idea is to simply outlaw ML-based recommendation algorithms, but obviously that is not as simple as it sounds and is mostly based on looking fondly on the earlier days of social media, when I felt like it was making my life better instead of worse.

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tayo42 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

I think banning algorithm based feeds is a start

Getting rid of any non personal accounts also. So no companies, brands, or meme accounts, and accounts that exist for non personal content only.

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carlesfe 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Banning them is a bit harsh and unrealistic, as they allow the platform to be monetized.

Here's my random idea: all commercial accounts must be labeled as such, and people should be able to opt-out from seeing any post by such accounts - except ads because, as I said, not allowing a platform to monetize is unrealistic.

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duxup 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I've seen a lot of algorithm type proposed legislation, sorting by date is an algorithm ... I kinda want that.

I think legislating what is good and bad math is going to be exceptionally difficult.

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asukachikaru 6 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Never thought about it but banning non personal accounts sounds like a good start. I doubt such social media would gain any meaningful popularity though.

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haijo2 6 days ago | parent [-]

Lol it would be dead. IG is running off of the fact that people utilise its platform to make money... I dont see how this is going to be practical.

	▲	HankStallone 6 days ago \| parent [-]
		It's not, that's why people want a regulatory body to do it. The only way to get people to use such a system would be to regulate the current ones out of existence.

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ismyrnow 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

China already has such legislation. They have placed restrictions on social media and internet use for children, and they censor content on these platforms.

Personally, I'm against government intervention for this sort of thing. I prefer government to be constrained to securing my liberties, rather than restricting my behavior "for my own good".

As a parent, I talk to my kids about social media like I talk to them about junk food. I want them to recognize that it's bad for them - it's addictive, and provides short term pleasure that results in long term misery. Avoiding it, or making good decisions about how you interact with it, is a personal responsibility issue.

	▲	bkettle 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		Is it possible that the current form of social media is actually contributing to the erosion of your liberties because it is so widely used in society and is likely contributing to polarization and antisocial behavior? I see this (and, honestly, most problems) as much more than a personal responsibility issue. To me, it’s an issue of misaligned incentives and unpriced downside costs. It’s clear that market forces push companies to build an addictive service that produces long term misery. It’s also clear that social media has a cost on its users (producing long term misery, reducing acute productivity) But this cost is not paid by the social media company. I’d argue that widespread use of the social media that today’s market incentives create is bad for society as a whole, not only for any one individual. Correcting market incentives that don’t align with social good is, in my opinion, one of the most essential purposes of legislation.

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duxup 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I agree that regulation is likely the only option.

With the caveat that it is very clear people want this horrible social media we have. They consume outrageous content, they pass it on, they create it for these platforms.

A lot of proposed regulation frames it as big bad tech companies making people do things like they're victims. But without people participating there would be nothing on there and in reality the human factor feeds back into these loops ... and keeps them going.

I think a lot of the proposed legislation comes at it at the wrong angle and is unlikely to fix it because in the end the users are a key component, not just some terrible algorithm or creepy CEOs.

	▲	bkettle 5 days ago \| parent [-]
		Hm. To me it is indeed the big bad tech companies at fault for implementing _obviously_ user-hostile functionality (mandatory suggested posts, for example) that exploit human nature to keep people engaged, even if people prefer not to. The existence and widespread use of screen time limits on phones seems like strong evidence that tech companies have built something nefarious here. And to me, it’s clear that they have done so intentionally to drive profit.

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kovezd 6 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yes. We should only allow social media in a printed format.

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klondike_klive 6 days ago | parent | next [-]

I'd go further and stipulate spoken word only. Or shouted in town squares by someone wearing a tricorn hat.

	▲	Ekaros 6 days ago \| parent [-]
		I am more partial to various jester caps. Good range of options.

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fivestones 5 days ago | parent | prev [-]

I think this is a joke but it’s interesting to note that Amish people have essentially this.

https://www.newarkadvocate.com/story/news/2022/09/30/ohios-a...

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rhubarbtree 6 days ago | parent | prev [-]

It’s a tricky one, but something that I repeatedly come back to is that publishers are regulated, but social media is a free for all. A newspaper can’t just make up something without consequences (in the UK), for example they may be sued for libel.

Social media companies, by contrast, can publish posts from their anonymised users that contain almost anything, and it is permitted. It can be racism. It can state that £300M a week could be spent on the NHS if only the UK would leave the EU. And those posts can be sent to millions of people without regard to truth or the damage they can do.

The classic response to this is “well, you can’t expect us to police such a large amount of content, it’s impractical” - a fair response - but then there’s a bit of sleight of hand from Meta et al: they conclude that they should therefore be allowed to broadcast anything a user shares. But an alternative conclusion is _well, then perhaps you shouldn’t be broadcasting inflammatory nonsense from any person/bot who posts_ and you have to find a new operating model.

It’s tricky because free speech is important, but I think we’ve seen enough times how dangerous, divisive, and destructive social media is. If there’s no way to prevent people and states from abusing it, then it probably shouldn’t exist. When the retrospective is written on the fall of America and the west, social media will be one of the key explanatory factors, along with hypercapitalism.

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rhetocj23 6 days ago | parent [-]

Newspapers have had a much longer history than social media.

I get why youre making the comparison, but, regulatory bodies tend to be averse to acting quick because they want "all the data" to be more certain in decision making. Such data only comes with time.

	▲	rhubarbtree 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		Fair point, although I think they've had sufficient time now.