Using a fake identity and hiding behind a language model to avoid responsibility doesn't cut it. We are responsible for our actions including those committed by our tools.
If people want to hide behind a language model or a fantasy animated avatar online for trivial purposes that is their free expression - though arguably using words and images created by others isn't really self expression at all. It is very reasonable for projects to require human authorship (perhaps tool assisted), human accountability and human civility
It's been a long time and our memory only goes so far back. I'm not even that old, but the time between WWII and my birth is waaaaay less then my current age. Jimmy Doolittle was still hosting Christmas specials on TV when I was a kid. Nobody knows who TF that even is now. I doubt half of America has even heard of the Third Reich. Sure, they know that "Nazi" is some kind of insult, but the rest is history forgotten. The last educational film on the matter was Indiana Jones III.
Those of us who remember history will continue to fight, and our numbers aren't small. Maybe one day we can begin to repair the enormous national and global damage that has occurred.
It's pretty much the UN concentration-camp conspiracy theory that rightwing nutters have been pushing for decades, except that now it's their guys doing it so it's all OK.
> As with most of the Nazis’ murderous actions, the deportation of German Jews was improvised and haphazard . The increased numbers of Jews arriving in the ghettos of eastern Europe led to severe overcrowding, unsustainable food shortages and poor sanitation. This, in combination with the slow progress in the German invasion of the Soviet Union, convinced the Nazis that a ‘solution’ to the ‘Jewish problem’ needed to be organised sooner than had been originally envisaged.
Fully agree. I have no issues with the social media laws as they don't impact my family at all except for YouTube. Accounts under Family Link control should have been allowed as they are overseen by an 18+ parent.
Youtube should have voluntarily removed shorts and the front page or made them available as a parental control to appease the regulator. When I wrote to the minister they used YouTube's addictive algorithms as justification for including them as social media which I do agree with.
We had curated kids logins with age restrictions, subscriptions, and ad free under premium and also youtube music with individual playlists they used for instrument practice etc. We had to shift music platform. I know we can replicate a lot of this with special apps and browser extensions but this was a single cross platform solution that was working for responsible parents. To be fair it is partly YouTube's fault for prioritizing Shorts and watch time over quality.
Fully agree, responsible parents should not allow their kids (including teenagers) to use Shorts or TikTok. It is a shame that YouTube does not support blocking that crap. It is obvious "Don't be evil" is not Google's motto anymore.
You can create two Google accounts and parental control yourself. You can also use ublock or other browser addons, and of course, NewPipe. Youtube should have more settings for this, it's clearly going down the drain, but it's not like you can do nothing.
Honestly, it's one of the reasons I don't want to pay for Youtube Red, why would I pay for "no ads", when I still feel like I'm the product, because of my complete lack of control over the algorithm and user experience.
> I have no issues with the social media laws as they don't impact my family
This is probably the most common reason for why our society is in the shitters wrt. laws. I find it problematic that people only care after they have been shown they are affected. Look at any anti-privacy laws. No one cares until they get thrown into jail for posting memes online.
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Youtube should have voluntarily removed shorts and the front page or made them available as a parental control to appease the regulator.
I honestly don't "get" the hate for YouTube Shorts:
While I clearly do prefer long-form videos on YouTube, in my Shorts feed I see videos that are, well, simply more short-form (admittedly because of the short length they are often more "shallow", but for sure not below some level that I would find annoying or unacceptable (and I think I am fast with such strong judgements)). So, at least judging from my Shorts feed, I can barely see any video that I would consider to be objectionable if I were a parent. It is quite possible that the YouTube algorithm detected very fast that I belong to a demographic that is not interested in particular kinds of videos that are perhaps common on YouTube Shorts and thus simply does not show them to me in my Shorts feed, so I am simply not aware of them.
So, seriously: why the huge hate for YouTube Shorts in particular concerning parenting?
> We had to shift music platform. I know we can replicate a lot of this ...
As far as practical solutions go a cheap VPS and a wireguard connection should let you continue with business as usual. From the perspective of YouTube maybe you moved to NZ or something.
> they used YouTube's addictive algorithms as justification for including them as social media
Did they provide YouTube the option of swapping out those algorithms to be exempted from the new law? It seems like this law was perhaps not a bad idea but the execution poorly thought out.
I won't be chasing an increasingly shitty online experience. I imported chromecasts before they were ever released here and had them connected via vpn to a US vps before services like Netflix went global. The pricing and content were really good value back then. Increasingly the relationship with big companies feels abusive. We are moving more towards self hosting, using physical media and changing lifestyle. Disconnecting isn't so bad.
Australia does not have a bill of rights. Our freedoms are guaranteed by our participation in the electoral process which is very high. This government governs with a large majority and the social media legislation is broadly popular with parents and older people.
The law of unintended consequences will apply. The legislation has been written in such a way that there is some flexibility in the application and there are some safeguards but its not directly addressing some of the biggest social harms. It's primary purpose (despite the conspiracies) seems to be populism and being seen to do do something for the kiddies.
The much bigger social problem is gambling which is out of control here. The second, related problem, is the use of techniques and studies by the gambling industry in games and social media to increase engagement which is what is messing with peoples heads. The government does not dare to touch the gambling industry or stop algorithmic placement of content. This would cause immense damage to company profits and create lobbying pressure.
So far from my experience this has been kind of low impact for adult users with existing accounts. Social media companies obviously have extremely good demographic data on their existing users as targeted marketing and influence is their core business.
Unfortunately this legislation hasn't addressed any of my real concerns with social media (it's the algorithms and engagement farming) and it is creating new problems.
Like Pascal's wager that absurdity is an appeal to stupidity. I expect the people running these companies are more interested in a different type of wager. One where they risk the future of the company to pump shares and make a quick profit.
This is a question of priorities. Identify a problem, decide to fix it, then execute. It isn't about the particular solutions. Australia's gun control would not translate to a country like the USA and perhaps neither would its health care. First decide to put a person on the moon. Then execute. Only one country did that. It isn't that they can't solve problems like school shootings or affordable healthcare. There is no real will to do so. Not sure why exactly. It is a very strange place that defies expectations of how a developed country would behave.
That would be weird and uncomfortable traveling with a kid. Is it geographic or is this madness taking over the world? Seems like something that would get a place destroyed in reviews and lose them business.
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