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This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18. New Mexico
by tristanj 3mo ago
This analysis actually understates how massive and outsized the penalties are. The court ruling only applies to children in New Mexico under age 18.
New Mexico has ~450,000 people under age 18, of which roughly 140,000 are between ages 13-17 (Meta officially requires age 13+ to use their platforms). Recent Pew surveys of U.S. teens ages 13–17 show ~70% of teenagers use Instagram and ~30% use Facebook.
In New Mexico, Instagram and Facebook would have ~100,000 users in the 13-17 group. That's not everyone, some underage users may lie about their age, so add in ~30,000 unauthorized users under age 13. Overall, around 130,000 people in the affected class.
The judge assessed $942 million in total penalties, and dividing that $942 million across 130,000 users equals approximately $7,250 in fines per user.
If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties, these kids could end up rewarded with thousands of dollars for just for having a Facebook or Instagram account. Which creates some bizarre incentives, minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place.
- LunaSea 3mo agoShouldn't you take into account all young adults that were in this age range in the last 10 or 15 years?
- tristanj 3mo agoMaybe, but in the official verdict they didn't take into account all affected children either; they only used an estimated 37,500 affected teen users to calculate the fine. Meta was fined for: - 37,500 instances of deceptive-practice violations @ $5,000 per - 37,500 instances of unconscionable-practice violations @ $5,000 per - 75,000 total violations x $5,000 = $375 million The rationale for only using 37,500 users (instead of the actual user count), and choosing $5,000 per instance (the maximum amount allowed by law) is unclear to me. The second case is even more confusing, New Mexico requested $953 million from Meta to pay for its "equitable share" of a $3.7 billion public-nuisance abatement program state experts created. A judge reduced this amount to only $567 million, determining that: 1) other platforms also share responsibility, and 2) some proposed expenses were too broad (ex: the judge denied the request for the construction of entire new hospitals and clinics as part of the program).
- nekusar 3mo agoWhat really sucks about all these types of judgements: Who's wronged here? The children. How much do they get for being wronged? Absolutely nothing. It all just goes to the governments coffers to be wasted away on a few PSAs directed at children.
- exe34 3mo agoIt's restitution to society, for the cost of the damage done.
- harimau777 3mo agoHow can it be restitution if it doesn't help the victims?
- exe34 3mo agoSociety pays the cost of mental health in reduced productivity, healthcare, accidents, homicides, etc.
- harimau777 3mo agoSure, but individuals pay the cost too. Society also has an obligation to make them whole or to at least give them accountability.
- exe34 3mo agoI suppose in the civilised world, society looks after the victims - but of course in 3rd world shit holes, they are on their own.
- bubblegumcrisis 3mo ago[dead]
- 59percentmore 3mo ago
- tgv 3mo ago> If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties Did you even read the first line of the article? "A New Mexico court has ordered Meta ... to pay $567m into a fund aimed at redressing adverse mental health impacts". It does NOT go to the children's purses. There's also a fine, which --as fines do-- goes to the state. Not to the individual children. > outsized Are you arguing it should be less?
- cwmoore 3mo agoIt should be honest that “redressing adverse mental health impacts” is code for “more sweet government jobs”.
- flatline 2mo agoAs critical as I am of NM, I don’t know that this is true. The state has been funding mental healthcare for 2+ years out of gross receipts revenue. A large part of this goes to Medicaid recipients - NM is one of the highest paying states for Medicaid providers, at least for mental health. The money from this may very well go into a public coffer used for similar purposes, ultimately paying out to private providers while mostly bypassing our broken health insurance system. I do question whether therapy services and the like are the best use of public funds for the people of NM. A lot of the state’s problems stem from a lack of economic opportunities, therapy isn’t going to help that. The state also carries a heavy burden of generational trauma which this could go some ways towards addressing, I suppose.
- brazukadev 3mo ago> Which creates some bizarre incentives, minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. how is this bad? that's a great incentive for the platforms to not signup minors anymore.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- SR2Z 3mo agoIt is however a great incentive for minors to sign up to platforms.
- lapetitejort 3mo agoThe minors are not getting the money. However, if I were a minor and knew me signing up for Meta would cost them five figures, I would absolutely sign up
- jnovek 2mo agoI think it’s perfect. It means that Meta can’t have squishy hand-wavy policies to keep minors off the platform, they’ll have to do real work and build real tools to keep them off because those minors are now a potential cost-center. Alternatively, they could just stop using manipulative tactics and continue to allow minors. That’s an option available to them as well.
- theLiminator 2mo agoThat's probably going to lead us to trusted attestation age verification.
- brookst 3mo agoIDK, even if you take your analysis to the extreme and say only 1% of those children suffered actual harm, it doesn’t seem unreasonable that the cost would be > $725k each, measured in impact to lifetime earnings plus the costs to their parents and community. There’s a good argument for using the funds to support mental health programs, but as far as paying for damage done, Meta is getting off very light here. Classic privatize profits, socialize costs.
- jumpinjack710 2mo ago[dead]
- mock-possum 2mo agoThat’s $7.25k, not $725k
- oxzidized 2mo agoI believe the jump to 725k is to account for the 1% figure they are using.
- SoftTalker 3mo agoKids are not going to see a dime of that money. It will get spent on a lot of political churn, propaganda, pet projects, and maybe some programs that will pay for a couple of hours of counseling for the kids.
- barbazoo 2mo agoStill better than Meta having the money imo
- Analemma_ 3mo agoWho cares? If it’s taken away from Meta and can no longer be used to build more technologies for Meta, that’s a massive upside to kids all by itself. Doubly-so if the fine incentivizes Meta to stop doing this shit. You could put the money in a big pile and light it on fire and it would still be a net win for society.
- cwmoore 3mo agoIt is not a net win when Justice is solely a destructive force. The absence of restoration to those harmed is a mutual burden.
- 59percentmore 3mo agoThe point of a fine is to change behavior. It's not outsize if it's enough to do that. >If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties, these kids could end up rewarded with thousands of dollars for just for having a Facebook or Instagram account. Good. https://www.thefader.com/2015/12/03/on-fleek-peaches-monroee-meechie-viral-vines https://www.thefader.com/2015/12/03/on-fleek-peaches-monroee... These platforms are so profitable precisely because they fleece users for way more value vis a vis their data than they get back in service utility. Balancing that equation is the right thing to do.
- cheschire 2mo agoI feel like you skipped the next sentence from GP. This type of award might not balance the equation the way you think it does.
- 59percentmore 2mo agoI understand now that this line >and Meta pays out to the affected parties probably won't come to pass, which I agree is not nearly as good. But I was responding to that possibility, as put forward by the the parent.
- Petersipoi 2mo agoThe line you conveniently skipped is > Which creates some bizarre incentives
- vkou 2mo agoPunishments for bad behavior need to exceed the crime, otherwise there's an clear profit-positive incentive to do crime.
- nashashmi 2mo agoI am not sure if a $7k payout is sufficient for the harm it has caused. Remember some people committed suicide. Some have mental problems
- nxm 2mo agoThis is ridiculous - you cannot attribute suicide to solely using Facebook.
- nashashmi 2mo agoThe judge said it FB was a "contributor".
- CookieCrisp 2mo agoBy this argument, could you ever attribute suicide to anything? Nothing is ever “solely” responsible
- vablings 2mo agoYou absolutely can attribute teen suicides especially in girls to Facebook/Instagram/Snapchat ect....
- jnovek 2mo ago> minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. That sounds like a great incentive for Meta to keep minors off of their platforms.
- logseman 2mo agoThe "incentive" doesn't exist because by the economies of these networks everyone is at this point at the very least profiled by Facebook so that they can be targeted by malfeasant ads, and a very large majority are already enrolled. Therefore, the harm has happened without having incentivised anyone.
- 1-more 2mo ago> minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. Vietnamese labor laws require higher salaries and more time off for working in hazardous/toxic conditions. These jobs become more attractive than the less toxic/hazardous ones.
- pasquinelli 2mo agoi don't think you're thinking through the incentives-- with higher labor costs the employer has an incentive to take steps to make the job less hazardous.
- 1-more 2mo agoYou say this is as though I were dunking on the idea of hazard pay, and that my dunking deserved a riposte dunking. I am not against hazard pay. Companies have not eliminated hazardous work in Vietnam yet, so the incentive has not gone all the way to its intended end.
- pasquinelli 2mo ago> If this fine remains, and Meta pays out to the affected parties, these kids could end up rewarded with thousands of dollars for just for having a Facebook or Instagram account. Which creates some bizarre incentives, minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. what does this really mean? you think kids in other states are going to rush out to make a facebook account in the hopes of getting the next payout?
- fooker 2mo ago> you think kids in other states Parents of the kids, realistically.
- graceful6800 2mo agoNo matter how you want to rearrange and inflate the numbers, it doesn't change the fact that the total amount does not cause any harm to Meta. This isn't a fine, its a tax. It's the cost of doing business. Meta certainly made more than $7.25k over the lifetime of each of those accounts. Maybe $7k will help these kids, but I doubt it, even if they receive the full amount. But Meta remains unaffected and free to continue harming other kids. That's the whole point of the complaints. Even if it were $7m or $700m per head, if Meta isn't harmed by the fine, it won't stop them harming more people now and in the future. It's great that an incredibly small number of people might theoretically get some money that hypothetically will be used to help them, but I'm far more concerned about everyone meta is still harming
- phpnode 2mo agoI would be amazed if the LTV of an instagram account is over $7k. Where are you getting that number?
- anigbrowl 2mo agoMeta certainly made more than $7.25k over the lifetime of each of those accounts. From those accounts? Doubt. Sure they make money from other things too, but I don't mind them making money from legitimate business activities. I am not a fan of the company but plainly they provide value to a lot of their users even if I consider their products mediocre and boring.
- outof 2mo ago$7,250 won't buy much therapy. They should get more.
- customguy 2mo ago> Which creates some bizarre incentives, minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. Oh please. Was the whole "calculation" just to make this seem like a well considered argument, or what? If the payout was to an entity other than the harmed one, you could say now that entity has incentive to have those minors harmed, instead. "Bizarre", heh.
- thomastjeffery 2mo ago> Which creates some bizarre incentives, minors get rewarded for signing up for the platforms that are harming them in the first place. Only if you set aside the passage of time.
- arendtio 2mo agoBut isn't a fine meant to hurt? I mean, isn't this the reason we have those X% of Y fines? So it seems less relevant how many people were harmed than who harmed them.