Magic_boXX Posted February 1 Posted February 1 Quote Regulating social media companies like Meta, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter) was a rare issue of bipartisan agreement during a Senate hearing on child safety. “We could regulate you out of business if we wanted to,” a frustrated Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C. told social media executives. Despite fireworks, there were few signs the hearing would change the regulatory outlook for the companies in the near term. https://www.cnbc.com/2024/01/31/meta-x-tiktok-snap-and-discord-confront-congress-eager-for-tighter-social-media-regulation-.html Some clips from the hearing. Full hearing video
Pheromosa Posted February 1 Posted February 1 Discord needs to do something about all the phishing attempts I have to deal with
Reginald Posted February 1 Posted February 1 If this ends with adults having to submit ID verifications, I am just going to quit the internet altogether. It's ridiculous that I need to potentially put my personal data at risk, because of bad parents who don't monitor their kids online activity. 7 3
Illuminati Posted February 1 Posted February 1 (edited) OGH discord getting shut down Edited February 1 by Illuminati 4
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 1 Posted February 1 The reality is we're caught in the middle between a government that wants to control how we use the internet and the content we consume, and billion dollar companies that want full access to our data and our free labour by engaging with their platforms to make them money. They're up in congress arguing about who gets what, and we're all just sitting here like obedient little sheep Tiktok, Twitter and the rest of them should be paying US for our data 4 1
Sheep Posted February 1 Posted February 1 Remember when the government used to regulate things that were proven to be dangerous to children instead of just doing a bit of political theater then taking a bribe under the table to do nothing annually?
Sheep Posted February 1 Posted February 1 3 minutes ago, Cameltoe Chariot said: Tiktok, Twitter and the rest of them should be paying US for our data They are with the billions of dollars of infrastructure you access for free daily. 1
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 1 Posted February 1 3 minutes ago, Sheep said: They are with the billions of dollars of infrastructure you access for free daily. That sounds like a lot of money to an individual person, but these platforms have a global monopoly on advertising and sales. The contrast between operation costs and actual profit for these pigs is WILD.
ATRL Moderator Bloo Posted February 1 ATRL Moderator Posted February 1 47 minutes ago, Reginald said: If this ends with adults having to submit ID verifications, I am just going to quit the internet altogether. It's ridiculous that I need to potentially put my personal data at risk, because of bad parents who don't monitor their kids online activity. Do you think this is the only issue at hand regarding regulating social media? 2
G.U.Y. Gaga Posted February 1 Posted February 1 Honestly I saw beheaded human head on Twitter yesterday without a single flag
Sheep Posted February 1 Posted February 1 54 minutes ago, Cameltoe Chariot said: That sounds like a lot of money to an individual person, but these platforms have a global monopoly on advertising and sales. The contrast between operation costs and actual profit for these pigs is WILD. Sorry but this is like saying television networks should be paying you.
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 1 Posted February 1 1 minute ago, Sheep said: Sorry but this is like saying television networks should be paying you. It really isn't, and you're missing my point. TV networks pay production companies to create content. This content is then packaged and sold to us to consume. Production companies/creatives -> Networks -> Audiences On social media however, a vast majority of people are generating viral content for free. These platforms ONLY exist because we use them to communicate. Our content and our data is used by these platforms to generate income, of which only a minuscule percentage trickles back to us through creator programs - and even then those creator programs are only accessible to a select few. Someone out there synced a video of Jenna Ortega dancing as Wednesday to Gaga's "Bloody Mary" sped up, and it became one of the biggest social media moments of last year. It spawned an entire campaign from Netflix, Gaga's team repackaged the song and sold special edition vinyls... SO much money was generated because someone had a creative idea and I can guarantee you they were not compensated for that. And before you argue whether or not they deserved compensation, there are careers in creative marketing where people earn a LOT of money for brainstorming ideas just like this one. I know this because I work in creative marketing. Social media is training creatives to work for free, and to not see value in their ideas and curation. THAT is my point. 1
Sheep Posted February 1 Posted February 1 (edited) 2 hours ago, Cameltoe Chariot said: It really isn't, and you're missing my point. TV networks pay production companies to create content. This content is then packaged and sold to us to consume. Production companies/creatives -> Networks -> Audiences On social media however, a vast majority of people are generating viral content for free. These platforms ONLY exist because we use them to communicate. Our content and our data is used by these platforms to generate income, of which only a minuscule percentage trickles back to us through creator programs - and even then those creator programs are only accessible to a select few. Someone out there synced a video of Jenna Ortega dancing as Wednesday to Gaga's "Bloody Mary" sped up, and it became one of the biggest social media moments of last year. It spawned an entire campaign from Netflix, Gaga's team repackaged the song and sold special edition vinyls... SO much money was generated because someone had a creative idea and I can guarantee you they were not compensated for that. And before you argue whether or not they deserved compensation, there are careers in creative marketing where people earn a LOT of money for brainstorming ideas just like this one. I know this because I work in creative marketing. Social media is training creatives to work for free, and to not see value in their ideas and curation. THAT is my point. This is a non-sequitur, THAT was not actually your point. You said these platforms should be paying us for our data, which they do with free access to extremely expensive platforms. As for the point you switched to in this essay that has nothing to do with your original one, there's a reason every child wants to be a professional influencer when they grow up. Money changes hand at every step in the social media chain too, not everybody gets a cut of the money because the vast majority of content actually costs the platform to host, people who reliably generate revenue for these platforms are given a share of it(just like how traditional TV networks invest content they can then run advertisements over). We can argue about how big that share is, how many users it applies to, but the fact will always remain that 99.9% of all content hosted by the services named in the op loses more money per upload that you think. Data centers do not grow on trees and are not a trivial expense at all. Maybe do some basic research on cloudflare's video on demand pricing for small deployments before trying to mansplain a business that you clearly aren't well informed on. These are not marketing companies they're online platforms. The fact that infinite video hosting and on demand streaming anywhere in the world instantly is a free service to everybody is borderline unrealistic and outside of the aggressive advertisement and data hoarding that Meta and Google do, has never actually proven to be a profitable business. As for Bloody Mary, the vinyls and CDs were 100% because of the song and not because of a sped up edit on tiktok, at a certain point the song outgrew that single video and people started consuming it because TABS. The edit unintentionally generated value for UMG the same way telling your friend where you bought a shirt might generate a sale for that business without you taking a cut. Marketing is about targeted, inorganic promotion. On top of all of this: Discord doesn't even sell advertisements and has zero discoverability of any kind, the vast majority of it's revenue is directly from Nitro subscriptions. Snapchat loses billions of dollars annually, only ever recording profits in a single quarter ever(those profits being from selling snapchat branded goods and not the content/advertisements on the app. Twitter was unprofitable even before Elon Musk tanked the brand and lost most of its prominent advertisers, and is trying to move the website closer to Discord's monetization practices as they're more sustainable. There's a reason TikTok is taking on huge losses currently to break into retail(free content hosting platforms aren't profitable just in case it didn't sink in the previous times) Pick a struggle; loud, wrong, AND condescending all at the same time was a little bit too much. These companies aren't being squeezed by regulators for not paying your aunt for the pictures of her cat they already pay to host. Edited February 1 by Sheep 1 2
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 1 Posted February 1 40 minutes ago, Sheep said: This is a non-sequitur, THAT was not actually your point. You said these platforms should be paying us for our data, which they do with free access to extremely expensive platforms. As for the point you switched to in this essay that has nothing to do with your original one, there's a reason every child wants to be a professional influencer when they grow up. Money changes hand at every step in the social media chain too, not everybody gets a cut of the money because the vast majority of content actually costs the platform to host, people who reliably generate revenue for these platforms are given a share of it(just like how traditional TV networks invest content they can then run advertisements over). We can argue about how big that share is, how many users it applies to, but the fact will always remain that 99.9% of all content hosted by the services named in the op loses more money per upload that you think. Data centers do not grow on trees and are not a trivial expense at all. Maybe do some basic research on cloudflare's video on demand pricing for small deployments before trying to mansplain a business that you clearly aren't well informed on. These are not marketing companies they're online platforms. The fact that infinite video hosting and on demand streaming anywhere in the world instantly is a free service to everybody is borderline unrealistic and outside of the aggressive advertisement and data hoarding that Meta and Google do, has never actually proven to be a profitable business. As for Bloody Mary, the vinyls and CDs were 100% because of the song and not because of a sped up edit on tiktok, at a certain point the song outgrew that single video and people started consuming it because TABS. The edit unintentionally generated value for UMG the same way telling your friend where you bought a shirt might generate a sale for that business without you taking a cut. Marketing is about targeted, inorganic promotion. On top of all of this: Discord doesn't even sell advertisements and has zero discoverability of any kind, the vast majority of it's revenue is directly from Nitro subscriptions. Snapchat loses billions of dollars annually, only ever recording profits in a single quarter ever(those profits being from selling snapchat branded goods and not the content/advertisements on the app. Twitter was unprofitable even before Elon Musk tanked the brand and lost most of its prominent advertisers, and is trying to move the website closer to Discord's monetization practices as they're more sustainable. There's a reason TikTok is taking on huge losses currently to break into retail(free content hosting platforms aren't profitable just in case it didn't sink in the previous times) Pick a struggle; loud, wrong, AND condescending all at the same time was a little bit too much. These companies aren't being squeezed by regulators for not paying your aunt for the pictures of her cat they already pay to host. Just say you want to be right instead of writing an entire essay, because you're willfully misunderstanding me at this point. I was not loud, I was not wrong, nor was I condescending in my response to your earlier dismissive reply. When I said these platforms should pay us for our "data", I meant the information they generate from our activity PLUS the content we create. I should've specified data AND content. I apologize for that. I respect your opinions, but I'm really not exaggerating about my work experience - I know what I'm talking about, I just happen to spend downtime on here because I'm addicted to pop culture. As for your breakdown about Discord, Snapchat and Twitter, well... all three of those apps are dead at this point. The big players are Meta (FB and IG) along with TikTok, and those are who I was primarily talking about.
Sheep Posted February 2 Posted February 2 1 minute ago, Cameltoe Chariot said: Just say you want to be right instead of writing an entire essay, because you're willfully misunderstanding me at this point. I was not loud, I was not wrong, nor was I condescending in my response to your earlier dismissive reply. When I said these platforms should pay us for our "data", I meant the information they generate from our activity PLUS the content we create. I should've specified data AND content. I apologize for that. I respect your opinions, but I'm really not exaggerating about my work experience - I know what I'm talking about, I just happen to spend downtime on here because I'm addicted to pop culture. As for your breakdown about Discord, Snapchat and Twitter, well... all three of those apps are dead at this point. The big players are Meta (FB and IG) along with TikTok, and those are who I was primarily talking about. I feel like you're mixing tiktok and Instagram up with the entire list of companies in the op.
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 2 Posted February 2 2 minutes ago, Sheep said: I feel like you're mixing tiktok and Instagram up with the entire list of companies in the op. How? TikTok and Instagram are two of the biggest platforms in that list.
I Am Music Posted February 2 Posted February 2 (edited) 4 hours ago, Bloo said: Do you think this is the only issue at hand regarding regulating social media? It’s definitely not and there’s bigger issues than that but this country has a real problem with personal accountability when it comes to what our children consume. Obviously parents can’t see what they’re doing 24/7 but the government for decades would blame music then video games and then movies and now the internet which in that instance is more nuanced than the others but the sentiment is the same. Edited February 2 by I Am Music
Sheep Posted February 2 Posted February 2 10 minutes ago, Cameltoe Chariot said: How? TikTok and Instagram are two of the biggest platforms in that list. If the issue was just those 2 platforms the others wouldn't be involved. You're mentioning issues that don't exist on platforms like Snapchat and Discord.
Cameltoe Chariot Posted February 2 Posted February 2 6 minutes ago, Sheep said: If the issue was just those 2 platforms the others wouldn't be involved. You're mentioning issues that don't exist on platforms like Snapchat and Discord. I'm done with this conversation. You're just trolling at this point.
harwee Posted February 2 Posted February 2 this will amount to nothing cause tech companies are at least 10 years ahead of these clueless government relics who get their own information from wikipedia.
ATRL Moderator Bloo Posted February 2 ATRL Moderator Posted February 2 1 hour ago, I Am Music said: It’s definitely not and there’s bigger issues than that but this country has a real problem with personal accountability when it comes to what our children consume. Obviously parents can’t see what they’re doing 24/7 but the government for decades would blame music then video games and then movies and now the internet which in that instance is more nuanced than the others but the sentiment is the same. But this isn’t the main concern about social media sites? Sure, that’s an element of it. But the way are data is harvested and sold, the negative effects of targeted advertisements, echo chambers, disinformation, etc. are all valid issues and we are discussing those things. It’s strange to just reduce all conversations about social media and possible regulations to just, “parents not monitoring their kids.” Even if that were the case, it doesn’t matter. These platforms profit off of intentionally marketing harmful content to children. Meta knowingly designed platforms that they knew was leading young people to feel depressed, sad, and isolated and would target content towards them even if they knew that content was harmful. There was a leaked document from Meta showing that they had done research on this and decided to continue promote such content because it drove up engagement. That’s a cogent point of investigation because no parent can unilaterally prevent their child from being online when the world effectively requires you to be on the Internet.
I Am Music Posted February 2 Posted February 2 (edited) 21 hours ago, Bloo said: But this isn’t the main concern about social media sites? Sure, that’s an element of it. But the way are data is harvested and sold, the negative effects of targeted advertisements, echo chambers, disinformation, etc. are all valid issues and we are discussing those things. It’s strange to just reduce all conversations about social media and possible regulations to just, “parents not monitoring their kids.” Even if that were the case, it doesn’t matter. These platforms profit off of intentionally marketing harmful content to children. Meta knowingly designed platforms that they knew was leading young people to feel depressed, sad, and isolated and would target content towards them even if they knew that content was harmful. There was a leaked document from Meta showing that they had done research on this and decided to continue promote such content because it drove up engagement. That’s a cogent point of investigation because no parent can unilaterally prevent their child from being online when the world effectively requires you to be on the Internet. I did say parents monitoring their kids media consumption is low on the list?, I was just adding to the original posters point of view that you quoted. Of course that’s not the main point, we’re actually agreeing with each other. Everything you said are things I already know and these companies do need to be put to task over these problems we’re not in disagreement there. These apps wanting to use our data and sell them to the highest bidder have been a problem for years but I wonder why it took them so long to finally address it. It’s also not lost on me they have something they want to gain out of this too, especially politically. This isn’t all about protecting the public and our data. Edited February 2 by I Am Music
Luckitty Posted February 3 Posted February 3 On 2/1/2024 at 10:44 PM, State of Grace. said: This was so ******* embarrassing, like... didn't this already happen last year? I swear I remember it happening either last year or in 2022, i'm so confused
Magic_boXX Posted February 4 Author Posted February 4 15 hours ago, Luckitty said: didn't this already happen last year? I swear I remember it happening either last year or in 2022, i'm so confused I believe so. It was during the time when the US accused china of using TikTok to spy on them.
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