That's a good point. The problem for me is where the line is drawn. Is a car enthusiast forum social media? How about youtube comments? I think society is generally improved when the teenage generation is at least part of discussions. We need to protect the young people but excluding them and suppressing them leads to unintended consequences. I am not a tiktok apologist. Hey Facebook used to be enemy number 1 and now it's an afterthought for many people.

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vladms 9 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I would draw a line at user customized wall of content. All content on sites should be organized in a similar way for everybody (by date, by category, etc.). I think this would reduce a lot the problems that we see currently.

If you want to be bold and imaginative, although doubt this would ever pass, any platform that focuses or allows user content, should not be allowed to show advertisements. Then the incentive to have people stay more to watch more ads would disappear.

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sejje 9 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think mostly you know it when you see it.

Infinite scrolling, algorithm based (not timestamp-based), "stories" (short videos), public (non-friend) accounts make up most of the feed, ads selling views and therefore companies trying to capture attention.

A car enthusiast forum is not doing this. phpBB sites get a pass. YouTube is, though. I think YouTube is part of the brain rot, although not the comments section.

FB, Instagram, X, tiktok, YouTube, Snapchat, etc.

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bahmboo 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

"you know it when you see it" is a trap and ripe for abuse in its own right. Your description however is pretty spot on for this moment in internet evolution.

Interesting to me is that I pay for youtube premium so I don't see any ads. They even have the jump ahead feature where you can skip in video project promotions. It's the most ad free experience I have on the internet. The comment sections are about the lowest of the low knuckle draggers and outright dimwits.

I'm also a bit out of touch because I quit all social media. Youtube shorts is about the closest I get and that's a mind sink for sure. [Edit: and hacker news which I consider social media without the ads]

	▲	sejje 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I mostly use YouTube without ads, and with sponsorblock, so a similar experience. I think YouTube shorts is exactly the experience we're talking about. And the youth watch it by scrolling up, not by selecting shorts that look interesting. I resisted shorts for a long time, but I watch them now as well. Prefer them, even. The fact we're not seeing ads, and that the comments are atrocious content, is irrelevant--our attention spans are at stake, not our wallets.

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NickC25 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Anything that promotes short-form video should be looked at.

Youtube promoting shorts is bad.

A youtube long-form video about, say, car repair, or quantum physics, or a history of eastern asian languages doesn't contribute to brain rot.

The Chinese, take it for what it's worth, knew how to control TikTok. They simply banned non educational content on the platform. You want to watch a 5 minute video explaining the basics of a math theorem, or explaining a chess opening? Sure, that's cool. Stupid 30 second clips of dances, memes, reactions, etc? Nah, that's dumb.

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sejje 8 hours ago | parent [-]

That's better imo, but creates a new problem.

As we can see anywhere and everywhere, moderation teams have to use their power, even when nothing is in violation of the rules. They'll start policing more content, and pretty soon they'll be arresting people.

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NickC25 8 hours ago | parent [-]

Youtube content moderators can arrest people?

	▲	sejje 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		We were talking about the state policing content in China. So the "YouTube content moderators" you mention would be government actors. Like they have in the UK--police arresting people for content. The police don't work for Facebook, I'm sure you realize.

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lm28469 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Everybody exactly knows where to draw the line... No one gives a shit about car enthusiast forums, everyone is talking about infinite scroll x targeted content x advertising powered by algorithms exclusively designed to extract your time, money and attention.

	▲	bahmboo 11 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		This is not helpful. "everybody" and "everyone" and "no one" are meaningless catch alls. I understand where you are coming from but this is a very limited world view that does not add anything to the conversation. I am sure that where I draw the line is not where someone else will draw the line. We do not know "exactly" where to draw the line.

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tzs 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Below is how New York's new law requiring social media sites defined the covered sites. It's based on how the site works, specifically if they have an "addictive feed" which is defined in the law. I'd expect most laws concerning social media would be drafted in a generally similar way.

> "Addictive feed" shall mean a website, online service, online application, or mobile application, or a portion thereof, in which multiple pieces of media generated or shared by users of a website, online service, online application, or mobile application, either concurrently or sequentially, are recommended, selected, or prioritized for display to a user based, in whole or in part, on information associated with the user or the user's device, unless any of the following conditions are met, alone or in combination with one another:

> (a) the recommendation, prioritization, or selection is based on information that is not persistently associated with the user or user's device, and does not concern the user's previous interactions with media generated or shared by other users;

> (b) the recommendation, prioritization, or selection is based on user-selected privacy or accessibility settings, or technical information concerning the user's device;

> (c) the user expressly and unambiguously requested the specific media, media by the author, creator, or poster of media the user has subscribed to, or media shared by users to a page or group the user has subscribed to, provided that the media is not recommended, selected, or prioritized for display based, in whole or in part, on other information associated with the user or the user's device that is not otherwise permissible under this subdivision;

> (d) the user expressly and unambiguously requested that specific media, media by a specified author, creator, or poster of media the user has subscribed to, or media shared by users to a page or group the user has subscribed to pursuant to paragraph (c) of this subdivision, be blocked, prioritized or deprioritized for display, provided that the media is not recommended, selected, or prioritized for display based, in whole or in part, on other information associated with the user or the user's device that is not otherwise permissible under this subdivision;

> (e) the media are direct and private communications;

> (f) the media are recommended, selected, or prioritized only in response to a specific search inquiry by the user;

(> g) the media recommended, selected, or prioritized for display is exclusively next in a pre-existing sequence from the same author, creator, poster, or source; or

> (h) the recommendation, prioritization, or selection is necessary to comply with the provisions of this article and any regulations promulgated pursuant to this article.

	▲	5 hours ago \| parent [-]
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