this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2026
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This feels like an awful argument to make. It's not the presence of those things that make Meta and co so shit, it's the fact that they provably understood the risks and the effects that their design was having, knew that it was harming people, and continued to do it anyway. I don't care if we're talking about a little forum run by a Grandma and Grandpa talking about their jam recipes; if they know that they're causing harm and don't change their behavior, they should be liable.
"We designed, marketed, and sold the gun, but we didn't think anyone would use it."
It's like if someone had a forum where insurrectionists were discussing how to build bombs and where they were going to use them, and the owners had an internal meeting where they said, "Hey, we're hosting some pretty awful people, should we maybe report them or shut this down?" and the answer was, "Nah, they're paying users, and we want their money."
Pretty sure Section 230 wouldn't protect them, either.
Yeah this feels very much like, "censor content, but don't change Meta's practices"
Which begs the question, does the author know what they're cheering for?
You can bet they do.
It's like he's describing a slot machine with unpainted wheels, leaving out the context that it's in a casino with a big "paint me and enjoy a share of the profit" sign above it.
The social media machine was designed to be a self-serve addiction generator. It intentionally used every trick it could legally get away with.
Also they can now generate content without users, which they already do a lot on Facebook.
I don't know. Seems like self-control issues. People can get addicted to anything: shopping, sex, internet use, work, gaming, exercise. I also disagree with prohibitions on gambling, drug use, prostitution: it's their money, their body, etc.
Penalizing systems of communication & information delivery seems overreach. The harm seems phony & averted by basic self-control.
Addictive Personality is a proposed set of traits that makes sufferers more vulnerable to developing addictive behaviors, including things like gambling or social media. Does it help to frame it in a different light for you if you think of it as those companies exploiting vulnerable peoples' disorders to extract money from them?
Telling those people to just have self control is like telling someone with depression to just stop being sad.
Or telling someone stupid to be more clever, as the case may be.