And that the actual act of these 3rd parties offering said products maintains not only the software, but the knowledge required to build it.

Death of true understanding because everyone feels entitled to paying the lowest perceived monetary cost possible for everything in their lives.

If you don’t think attention spans are on the downtrend & that social media has something to do with that, I don’t know what to tell you. I think it’s pretty clear.

This ban does not prevent kids from using IM platforms like WhatsApp, Messenger, Discord so your argument that this somehow restricts the ability for online communication is false.

What you are arguing against is the restriction of access to apps like TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, X, Snapchat —- all of which are filled with predatory algorithms that have shown to have negative affect on the mental health of teens, young adults, AND adults.

> Kids are in these spaces because there is no place for them to be. People call the police on unaccompanied kids outside. Teens are banned from malls. Where are teens supposed to be where they won't be harassed. When I was a kid we used to just wander around and chat. There used to be a whole event on Friday evenings where high schoolers would decent on this mall across the street from two movie theaters. We went to the skating ring. There were teen clubs. More. Right now, I can't think of a single place a teen could just hang out besides at each other houses which is mostly what I watch them do. It makes sense why they end up in virtual spaces. They can socialize privately that way.

What I am saying is that we should work toward bringing those ^ spaces BACK, rather than allowing kids to wallow in digital space. The more we are online, the more difficult that becomes. The more time we spend in digital space, the more we lose control over our physical spaces.

But you can’t solve that issue with policy. It’s a cultural issue. People are not willing to pay for the content they consume (with money).

Not to mention you would collapse the US economy (I’m not sure if you’re US based, just speaking from my perspective), and likely others, if you applied a blanket ban on ad-supported media.

It is not a ‘myth’ that one of the use cases for their color changing is camouflage, I’m not sure what they are on about.

I’m not advocating for completely restricting access to AI for certain age groups. I’m pointing out that historically we have restricted prolonged interactions with certain stimuli that have shown to be damaging to cognitive development, and that we should make the same considerations here.

I think it’s hard to deny that younger generations have been negatively affected by the proliferation of social media engineered around fundamentally predatory algorithms. As have the older generations.