To our digital thriving community -
It’s impossible to choose a single emoji to express the emotions we’ve felt about this week’s landmark Meta settlement news, so here are seven: 😯🥳🤨😮💨😵💫🧐🫶
🗞️Some brief context on the news...
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META REACHES LANDMARK $18 BILLION SETTLEMENT WITH STATES IN TRIAL OVER TEEN SOCIAL MEDIA ADDICTION
“Meta has agreed to pay $17 billion and add stronger child-safety measures to its Facebook and Instagram platforms to end a landmark trial over teen social media addiction and settle claims filed by 47 states, state attorneys general announced Wednesday. The settlement resolves a pivotal legal case years in the making that sought to hold the tech giant accountable for the role its platforms played in undermining children’s mental health.”
Read more reporting on this story from Barbara Ortutay, Kelvin Chan and Kaitlyn Huamani.
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The Meta settlement marks a pivotal moment for youth, parents, policymakers, and advocates who share our belief that young people deserve to thrive in our tech-filled world. The outcome reminds all of us what acting together can do, and why we should never underestimate the power of collective agency. People holding big tech accountable deserves recognition and celebration in and of itself. 🥳
Our Critically Optimistic Reflections
At CDT, we’re critical optimists when it comes to teens and tech. We strive to balance: critical thinking about the current state of affairs with an optimistic view that we can build the future that young people deserve.
Right now, we're optimistic about these efforts to make social media better for youth well-being by default. We’re encouraged that the settlement includes specific changes to platform features. And we think the requirement for an independent auditor to assess Meta’s good faith progress holds real promise. 🫶
While Meta only represents a subset of the social media platforms that young people use today, the settlement also puts pressure to shift industry standards by calling on Snap, TikTok, and YouTube to agree to similar measures. The full value of Meta's payout depends on whether these companies also settle with states (agreeing to financial penalties and product changes, like Meta).
We’ll be closely following the impacts of the proposed design shifts like options for pause prompts, night mode by default, and hidden likes — all of which Meta agreed to adopt as safety features and which are rooted in existing evidence (🤓). We know from behavioral science that pauses are a powerful way to support more intentional tech use and that we should “never sleep on sleep” for developing minds who need rest for their mental and physical health. For years, teens have told us directly about the ways that social media features can prey on developmental sensitivities to peer approval and social comparison.
Acknowledging flawed features is progress and we hope these changes protect young people’s physical and emotional health as well as (or better than 🤞) the ones that compromised it.
But collective agency means that we all need to keep asking critical questions about how these promises play out, too. In that spirit, some things we’re wondering about include:
- 🧐 Will age assurance actually work, and at what cost to youth agency and rights? Much of the settlement’s implementation rests on the unsteady shoulders of age assurance measures and technology. Age assurance has proven challenging to implement and brings with it a tangled web of privacy concerns and risks to
youth everyone.
- 💔 What about youth who don’t have a trusted adult in their lives? The proposed measures also hinge on the premise that all young people have a trusted adult in their lives to grant them access to digital spaces, when we know that far too many do not. This is particularly worrisome when you consider that, for some vulnerable youth, online communities are true lifelines.
- 🤨 How will youth navigate this new app landscape, for better and for worse? We’ve seen again and again that teens take up and use technologies in ways that aren’t always intended — including finding workarounds that keep their digital lives mostly the same or push tech use into the shadows. So we’ll be watching (and listening) for unintended impacts as the platform changes roll out.
- 😵💫 What about changes to AI design (arguably already overdue)? It’s impossible not to reflect on this news and think about generative AI, which is already on teens’ devices, in Meta’s apps, and reshaping our lives and learning. For two decades, debates over whether social media is “good” or “bad” too often crowded out conversations about meaningful supports and action. Obviously with AI, we can't wait until 2046 to make youth well-being a priority‼️
Phew! Taking a big step back (and a deep breath in 🧘): will this moment be the tipping point many of us have been hoping for, or a double-edged sword for youth agency and well-being?
Yes, the proposed changes offer youth more agency over their social media experiences by providing more feature control. And yet they also risk limiting the agency and rights of young people — especially vulnerable youth whose digital access may be instrumental to their wellbeing.
We cheer for this progress, and we have to believe that so much more is possible 💜.
We hope the energy of this news creates the momentum we all need to meet the moment, both for and with teens. As you grapple with your own feelings about the settlement, try asking a young person: What about this news feels helpful, and what's missing? Because the path toward digital thriving needs to be forged together, with young people’s voices reflected and respected. 🫶
✨Stay critically optimistic out there,
The Center for Digital Thriving Team
