Discussion keeps the world's turning.
This is Roundtable. You're listening to Roundtable.
With myself, young, we're coming to you live from Beijing.
I'm joined by Yushan and Steve Hatherley in the studio coming up for today's young people or digital natives.
Social media is everywhere.
New York has just rolled out tough new laws to keep kids safe online, including curbing addictive feeds, safeguarding data, and enforcing a digital bedtime.
China, on the other hand, has pioneered these protections since 2021 with strict regulations.
What impact will these measures have on the next generation's online habits?
In your voice matters, we would love to hear it and our hard to hard segment got a question.
Something you're itching to share.
If you're up that voice memo and please hit us up at eZFM Aroundtable at FoxMail.com.
Our podcast listeners can find us at Roundtable China on Apple Podcast.
Now for something a bit different but equally fascinating.
Have you ever wondered just how deep the social media rabbit hole goes for our kids, tweens and teens?
It's everywhere. Weibo, WeChat, Red, Instagram, TikTok and so on easily accessed via your phone in the pocket.
Our children are swimming in it daily.
Recently, New York has stepped in with some groundbreaking laws to ensure the young ones aren't drowning in the digital sea with algorithms designed to keep them hooked.
New York is saying enough is enough and they're not alone.
China has enforced its own strict regulations to safeguard its youth online since 2021.
We'll dive into these protection measures and what they mean for parents and kids alike.
So talk about the Empire State of Social Media Protection.
Steve, what are these two New York State social media laws in tail?
Well, there's going to be two and it was in June of this year.
That's when New York Governor Kathy Hocal announced that these two new state laws would be signed.
And again, it's important to note, these are not national laws in America.
This is specific to the state of New York.
But the laws themselves are designed to protect kids who are under 18 years old from what they call the dangers of the online world and the laws are designed to clamp down on digital platforms, algorithms and the use of kids data as well.
This hasn't been done before.
This is completely unprecedented and it makes the state of New York the first state to pass a law regulating social media algorithms.
And this is happening amid nationwide allegations as a matter of fact that apps like Instagram and TikTok have really addictive qualities that children are not capable of making the proper decisions about to say enough is enough in terms of their usage.
I mean, for adults it's hard enough to stop scrolling whether it's in the morning or before bedtime.
I would imagine it's even harder for the kids to just know that they should spend less time online because ultimately social media is just a people network online but only moved online, right?
So these days kids, we were just discussing about this before the show.
Kids are born with such technology available to them already.
So sometimes they can't really tell the difference and if overly engaged in such technologies maybe not maybe it's like already it's like doing harm to them.
Well see that's part of the debate here.
Is it doing harm or is it not?
But we'll get to that in just a sec.
And you asked me what exactly are these laws.
So let's get to it. The first one, the stop addictive feeds exploitation for kids act or the safe for kids act.
It requires social media platforms and app stores to seek parental consent before children under the age of 18 use apps with what they call quote addictive feeds.
And this is groundbreaking in their attempt to regulate these recommendations that come from the apps or from the algorithms.
That's the first one. The safe act is going to prevent apps from sending notifications to a child or teenage users between midnight and 6 a.m.
It's like a bedtime. Yeah.
Isn't it for the applications after 12 and before six, no notifications allowed whatsoever for the for that age group.
It's really, really strict, isn't it?
The second one, the second law is the New York Child Data Protection Act and that limits the information that app providers can collect, the data that they can collect about this particular age group.
And also we've seen in recent years, China have been putting in efforts on a national level to well, actually there are a few things that have been going on, including one regulation targeting underaged gamers.
We know video games can be very addictive and in other areas of the online world as well.
So you shouldn't could you tell us a bit more about those things?
Sure. Similar like legal directives in China, one more recent one is an order released by the government in October last year in 2023, which is the cyberspace protection regulation for miners.
It's in a bit to provide a cyber environment that's good for the physical and mental health for China's over 191 million internet users younger than 18 years old.
And this new regulation, relatively new regulation, which is the first of their kind here in China, stipulate that schools and well technology companies should provide terminals, softwares or apps with special functions to intervene and better protect miners from internet addictions and harmful contact.
And also I think this is a following of what we mentioned earlier, Huyang, the 2021 rules from the cyberspace administration of China that you know that time one major function that's added to a lot of the social media platforms and also apps and games is what's called the youth mode, Qing Xiaonian Mo Shu, which is something to control gaming and content providing
time for users aged under 16.
So in youth mode, for example, users are barred from live streaming broadcasts in certain times, also like kids under 16 or 18, they're not allowed to give gifts or like offer like money to the live streamers or play games when it's during that specific time period.
Again, like a legal bedtime, isn't it?
Yeah. Social media representatives have responded to this.
I mean, this is big news in the United States because again, it's the state of New York and it was unprecedented.
This is happening for the first time.
So Metta, a spokesperson from Metta said, we don't agree.
While we don't agree with every aspect of these bills, we do welcome New York becoming the first state to pass legislation recognizing the responsibility of app stores.
According to research, the vast majority of parents support legislation requirements to app stores to obtain parental approval to download apps.
So net choices and industry body, they represent a lot of the major tech companies, including Google and X and Metta and Snap.
They were a little bit more direct in their response.
They called this measure from New York unconstitutional.
They also called it heavy handed and they said that these laws could have consequences that aren't even intended, like increasing the risk of children being exposed to harmful content by removing the ability to curate the feeds.
And what that means is, if you have a 12 year old kid, for example, and your 12 year old kid is really into animation.
So that means the algorithm is going to be recommending videos or posts on animation.
Now that's the algorithm doing what it's supposed to do.
It sees what you like and then it recommends feeds.
But this representative is saying or what net choice is saying is, if you take away that part of the algorithm, you can't control.
Nobody can control what is going to pop up on that child's feed.
And that could even be more dangerous than becoming addicted to the content, to the animation content that's being provided.
That is very interesting.
I wonder if one endeavor that's been tried out here in China could be of any inspiration at all.
There was this new measure that happened a couple of years ago.
That's one internet online platform sort of created this huge pool of content, very educational.
I don't know how exciting that can sound for people, but apparently very good for miners.
And then a lot of this, the stuff that's going to be pushed to young viewers is going to come from that pool.
And if you make that pool, I suppose fun and educational content, then potentially I think it could be something that might be good for people.
But I remember being a kid and being especially a rebellious teenager.
That is, if you tell me what to do, I'm going to find a way to not do it.
Yeah. Sorry, Bob and Dad.
And that's why the state of New York wants to take that decision out of the children's hands.
And that's not even the strictest measure that they're looking at doing in the United States.
The state of Florida is looking at taking it a step further as well.
They're looking, and this wouldn't happen until 2025.
But Florida, his name's Ron DeSantos.
He signed into law a bill that would restrict social media access for miners.
And this law again, it would go into effect January 1st of 2025.
It would bar children in Florida under the age of 13 from having a social media account at all.
If this goes into effect, and it will January 1st, 2025, if you're under 13, you can't have a TikTok account.
You can't have a, any kind of social media account.
And if you're 14 or 15, you're going to need your parents consent to do that.
Now, there's an interesting part of this story.
They expect Florida House of Representatives, Paul Renter, the speaker of the house.
He said, we know that the companies are going to sue the second this gets signed.
I think January 1st is going to be a busy day in the courts.
But anyway, that's what they're looking to do in Florida as well.
Florida in New York, they're looking to take control back from social media.
I think that sounds like a great idea.
Do you really? Yeah, well, I'm the, I guess I can come off as a little bit heavy handed when it comes to protecting the youth while the, why do you say that?
Because this is such a divisive issue.
And there are clear arguments on both sides that make a lot of sense.
So why do you think this is a good decision?
Especially for young people when we're talking about teens, tweens, well, if you're a teenager, maybe it's debatable, but especially for, for kids and tweens, I just don't think that the online place is a safe enough place.
And it's not just about curating age-appropriate content.
It's what people say to you.
And I think that's the part that is most difficult to, because I see that when you're young and in those formative years, and I recall those memories of you just want to fit in and you want the approval of other people, when you grow older or maybe for exceptionally mature young people, then you realize that you don't need to depend on other people's guesses to find
your own value, but when you're young and then you're on social media, which is all about, quote unquote, connecting with other people.
And it's bound to be not all positive feedbacks and then relying on that to sort of find yourself worth and feeling being shot down all the time and thus having a negative influence on yourself worth or sense of self.
I think it's just incredibly difficult to grow up in that environment and to jump into the pool when you're a little bit older and mature.
And I think could potentially be a good thing.
It's like in China, we don't really have the legal drinking age issue, but in the US, you can't drink until you're 21 in most days.
Sure. Canada too, and you can't drive a car until you're of a certain age.
You can't vote until you're of a certain age.
So what you're saying is why not put a law in place where you have to be a certain age before you use social media?
Yeah, and I think 16 or 18.
I mean, it doesn't sound too bad to me, but I haven't done thorough research and I like to see more studies that support my point of view.
What do you think about this?
Yeah, what do you think about it?
Well, before I tell how I feel about it personally, here are some data to just back who young up on just...
Oh, no, it's probably a good thing.
It's probably a good thing.
Yeah, it's probably a good thing though.
Like young people are banned from social media at a younger age.
And this is a survey done in 2021 by Chinese organization called the China Internet Network Information Center.
And this survey is done on over 26,000 miners here in China and according to the survey, more than a quarter of the young respondents said they had encountered cybersecurity incidents in the past six months as per that survey happened.
And that include Internet fraud, viruses, and leaked personal information according to a report, of course, the report following the survey.
And also around 38% said they had been subject to harmful or pessimistic and negative content via videos made to show off wealth or those promoting lying flat or not working hard kind of themes and doing the...
Just all kinds of negative contents online.
And we can see like certain number of youngsters these days they're being affected by such information online that's without any filter at all.
Quick question. I wonder if this is maybe a small point of cultural difference like flaunting your wealth, showing off that, oh, somebody's got a lot of money.
Well, that's what social media is.
Yeah, it's about showing off.
It's about... Yeah. It's about...
Yeah. Here's how perfect my life is.
High social media app. Here's why my life is hard.
And you can only post things where you fail, right?
If you get a terrible test score or you order food that doesn't taste very good, then you post that stuff, not you on a yacht in the middle of the beautiful blue ocean or something like that.
This is an issue where a lot of people agree with you, young.
It's not just the state of New York.
It's not just the state of Florida.
We saw here in China, the government is looking to protect young people as well.
Also in the UK, in the middle of 2025, they're going to have something called the Online Safety Act.
And that's meant to put the onus on social media firms and search engines to protect kids from legal but harmful material.
You know, I think... And again, we were chatting about this before the show as well.
Some people now are growing up at an age where they didn't know a life without social media, right?
This is just normal. But parents and governments are looking at this as something that's brand new.
And they're seeing this now, perhaps when they didn't see it before, as something that needs to be regulated.
Is it addictive? Is it not addictive?
That's hugely debatable because if you look at studies that have been published on both sides, you can find evidence that...
It supports both. No, it's not addictive.
Yes, it is. But what we can see here for sure, and this new decision by the state of New York, is that governments have decided we need to step in.
We need to assist parents in helping their children control their addiction to what they call their addiction to social media.
You point to a very fascinating part of this global discussion.
That is really a social media that bad, is it really that addictive?
And then actually, there are really conclusive evidence pointing to either direction, but also we're seeing more negative news or bad things happen to young people.
And then they say, oh, it's because I live in this world where this and that happened and then sort of in a really nebulous way, but all those factors seem to sort of point to this internet life that we're all engaged in every day.
Yeah, but there are studies that say this isn't such a bad thing.
Pete Etchels is a professor of psychology and science communication at Bath Spa University.
He also wrote a book called Unlocked, The Real Science of Screen Time.
And this is what he said.
There's a real sense of urgency about this whole situation that we must be doing something right now this minute to fix this problem.
But he also said, just because it feels like an urgent problem to fix doesn't mean that the first solution that comes along will actually be the one that works.
And what I take away from that quote is, is the state of New York, is the decision to cut notifications between the hours of 12 and 6 a.m.
is Governor DeSantis's decision to ban 12 year olds or 11 year olds from even having social media accounts at all.
Is that the right decision?
Is this going to solve the problem as they see it as the problem?
Well, we don't know, do we?
This is completely and this is just my personal opinion.
We're living in a time where this is unprecedented, right?
Some parents are learning about this as we go.
Social media started off what, back in early 2000s around that time, but they're seeing it as a problem with addiction starting now, it seems.
So now they're trying to figure out the solution to a problem that they never had before.
They can't look back at history and say, well, at that time we use this to fix this problem.
Let's use that solution again.
They're trying to figure this out as they go.
Yeah, and just to echo quickly with what Steve mentioned, I think, if, say, I'm imagining myself as a minor who is under 12 and living in, is it Florida that we're talking about?
And I'm banned from using just platforms such as TikTok just simply because of my age.
The first thing I think about is not to argue about it, but rather find ways to just how I can get on.
How do you enforce these things?
That's the other big issue that's going to come up.
But this is a very real issue that every family out there, I bet, is talking about.
That is what is the age that is appropriate to give your kid a phone?
When is the right age to let them on social media?
And I wonder, I mean, if there's like a kid's pool, a kid's app, then, nah, I don't, that's like, you know, fighting fire with fire.
Yeah, well, it's like, you don't get like creepy people, like sending kids to the kid's stuff.
Yeah, but at the same time, kids turning 12, 13, 14 years old, do they want to use something that's labeled kids?
Probably not. Yeah. Right.
They want to use the cool, the cool new thing.
How do you, how do you enforce this?
You know, in Florida, January 1st, 2025, if you're not, if you're under a certain age, you can't have social media.
How do you enforce that?
Someone signs you up for a fake account, right?
It's still you. It's still the 12 year old using that social media account.
How in the world are they going to enforce this?
That's what a lot of people are arguing too.
Well, here in China, something similar is being already being enforced, but not in such a scale, I would assume, because the dough in, which is China's version of TikTok, automatically puts accounts of users aged under 14 into youth mode.
So we're not, we're not just banning them, but just giving them youth mode automatically, seeing that, okay, you're young and young enough.
And which kind of limits their screen time on the short video platform to only 40 minutes per day.
So by banning them from it, they have limited access to it here in China.
You know that company strategy when you can't fire an employee, but you can encourage them to quit.
You give them, you give them the smallest office, you know, in the basement third floor where there's no lighting and eventually they'll just quit and leave.
It kind of sounds like that strategy.
Here kids, we're going to control your face.
Here's a, here's an advertisement for carrots to remind you how delicious they are.
Eventually a kid will say, that's super boring that app and I don't want to use this anymore.
Maybe that's an effective strategy.
Well, certainly I think we learn from our mistakes and we learn from our experiences.
I remember getting very hooked to Facebook when I was in college and back then it was still only open to campus users, you have to go to a particular university to use it back in that day.
And but then you sort of gradually start to realize this is just taking up too much of my time and all kinds of things and then you start to curtail your usage.
You start to realize that you shouldn't be relying on, you know, the comments and those kind of things.
But that takes a long time, doesn't it?
That you're talking about something that takes place over the course of a couple to two or three or four or five years ago, months for you.
I think what parents are concerned about here or the government or the state of New York is concerned about here is that if kids are becoming addictive to their social media feeds and we can blame the social media outlets, the platforms themselves for providing those algorithms that make the kids addicted, the kids aren't eating properly.
They're not sleeping properly.
They're suffering in school.
Those are things that are going to happen to them now that are going to affect their future before they learn those very important messages that you just talked about.
Like, well, I don't need to be spending this much time on here.
It's actually not good for me at all and I should be doing other things that are more productive.
12-year-old, 13-year-old maybe doesn't have the capacity to make those decisions on their own.
I agree with you, but don't you think, well, aside from ban or not ban or regulating stricter or not, teaching people, this is also part of digital literacy, teaching young people how to use the internet in a more responsible way, isn't that also very important?
Yeah. Absolutely right, and that's what people argue, too, rather than blocking the kids from these apps.
Let's find out together how to use these properly so that they aren't harmful because it's not like they're going anywhere.
It's not like the internet is going to just disappear tomorrow.
Let's learn how to use it correctly.
You're absolutely right.
Whether than just believing in conclusions online saying how social media is damaging kids' mental health or their physical routines every day.
I think it's better if on a family basis the parent can just try to guide their children to a more adaptable way of using social media while just completing their daily tasks, such as going to school, such as completing homework and stuff, because I was reading that the science, linking social media and mental health problem is kind of unclear as well.
There's no sharp conclusion, John already that just saying that over the using social media will definitely lead to mental health issues.
Yeah, you can say if a child drinks alcohol, obviously black and white, it's clear.
That's very bad for a child.
SIGARETS, same thing, very bad social media, a bit of a gray area, hence the debate.
Yes, and also you see these studies that say young people feel very more accepted, possibly finding their own people online, and that can have a positive effect on people.
And that's what people who are against this law say.
They say, hey, this is a great place to make new friends.
It's a great place to learn social skills and things like that too.
Yes, so definitely. Definitely.
Good luck fixing this one, right?
Two sides of the coin, and all these efforts are aimed at giving our children the tools to navigate the internet responsibly and with greater awareness.
That's it for today's roundtable.
