The sensible way would be to sell little $5 USB dongles only to 18+ people that allow you to tap in a short simplified ID code to identify yourself as an adult. It would be good enough for age verification, hell make it illegal to pass it to minors, like it is with hard liquor or cigarettes. Would be anonymous without requiring a phone number (and ID indirectly), and could store encryption keys. And it would solve the problem of porn and age verification. It would solve so many problems.
When signing up to an account you need one of those and if you get banned you need to buy another one. That prevents abuse and trolling too. They would be cheap, but people would still not spam them. And they don’t require two factor bullshit or phone numbers, because they are a secure device already. The same dongle could be used for online banking in addition to your passcode.
This is trivial to solve. What they want is mass surveillance. Which makes them traitors.
Are you suggesting they be banned outright from all? Here you have to weigh the freedom of citizens against the need to protect them from harm. It’s easier to argue that underage children are unable to choose for themselves, but what would be the basis for limiting the freedom of adults?
Banning no, but regulating yes. You used to need (or still technically need) a broadcast license or something to broadcast news or public a news paper. So historically this would have been the default, that if a newspaper publishes hate speech or derogatory lies about a person, that they can be legally stopped from doing this. All that went mostly out the window for social media, who have taken over news “reporting” and political commentary, replacing it with algorithms that act purely for profit and deliberately create divisions and polarization. The government absolutely has a duty to protect adults from that. Addictive substances have also been outlawed / regulated.
It’s just that when all this started it was small and harmless and most computer nerds were very much against any kind of regulation. We were warned but I was an idiot back then too. Now we have an overwhelming concentration of global political power in the hands of e.g. Zuckerberg and others controlling social media, for profit, for neoliberal political goals, for the suppression and diversion of political expression, or promoting fascist political ideology. It’s really only since ~2010 with Trumps rise and backlash to Obama that things quickly became this bad.
We are supposed to be a democracy, but today unchecked foreign political power not just influences the opinions of people, but sets the agenda.
I would absolutely be in favor of banning all unregulated (e.g. US) social media and creating an EU wide public utility social media network. Just make reddit, facebook, insta and all that stuff inaccessible in the EU unless they comply with very stringent regulation and moderation and a “non-profit” approach. China and Russia have their own media not just to suppress dissent, but to protect themselves from US influence. But I do think we now know enough to create a better alternative than either.
Yeah if they’d regulate this unchecked media power our world wouldn’t be this bad. Like mandating proportional human moderators to keep garbage, hate speech, grifters and criminals out.
The sensible way would be to sell little $5 USB dongles only to 18+ people that allow you to tap in a short simplified ID code to identify yourself as an adult. It would be good enough for age verification, hell make it illegal to pass it to minors, like it is with hard liquor or cigarettes. Would be anonymous without requiring a phone number (and ID indirectly), and could store encryption keys. And it would solve the problem of porn and age verification. It would solve so many problems.
When signing up to an account you need one of those and if you get banned you need to buy another one. That prevents abuse and trolling too. They would be cheap, but people would still not spam them. And they don’t require two factor bullshit or phone numbers, because they are a secure device already. The same dongle could be used for online banking in addition to your passcode.
This is trivial to solve. What they want is mass surveillance. Which makes them traitors.
The whole idea of age verification is missing the point that these platforms are harmful to adults, too.
Are you suggesting they be banned outright from all? Here you have to weigh the freedom of citizens against the need to protect them from harm. It’s easier to argue that underage children are unable to choose for themselves, but what would be the basis for limiting the freedom of adults?
Banning no, but regulating yes. You used to need (or still technically need) a broadcast license or something to broadcast news or public a news paper. So historically this would have been the default, that if a newspaper publishes hate speech or derogatory lies about a person, that they can be legally stopped from doing this. All that went mostly out the window for social media, who have taken over news “reporting” and political commentary, replacing it with algorithms that act purely for profit and deliberately create divisions and polarization. The government absolutely has a duty to protect adults from that. Addictive substances have also been outlawed / regulated.
It’s just that when all this started it was small and harmless and most computer nerds were very much against any kind of regulation. We were warned but I was an idiot back then too. Now we have an overwhelming concentration of global political power in the hands of e.g. Zuckerberg and others controlling social media, for profit, for neoliberal political goals, for the suppression and diversion of political expression, or promoting fascist political ideology. It’s really only since ~2010 with Trumps rise and backlash to Obama that things quickly became this bad.
We are supposed to be a democracy, but today unchecked foreign political power not just influences the opinions of people, but sets the agenda.
I would absolutely be in favor of banning all unregulated (e.g. US) social media and creating an EU wide public utility social media network. Just make reddit, facebook, insta and all that stuff inaccessible in the EU unless they comply with very stringent regulation and moderation and a “non-profit” approach. China and Russia have their own media not just to suppress dissent, but to protect themselves from US influence. But I do think we now know enough to create a better alternative than either.
We can ban the parts that are harmful such as personally targeted reccomendations
Yeah if they’d regulate this unchecked media power our world wouldn’t be this bad. Like mandating proportional human moderators to keep garbage, hate speech, grifters and criminals out.
You’re totally right. But also not. As protecting kids can’t surely be the main reason for this. At best it’s a welcome side-effect.
So your trivial solution would be great but defeating the purpose 😑
European politicians supporting age verification deserve an earful of criticism.
SLAM!