Exempted for now…
Thats great. I do fear that it’ll still pretty much be a requirement if they continue to force age verification through websites etc.
Yep, how is it even supposed to work with OSS? Can’t use those websites?
Exactly. It’s optional… as long as ypu don’t plan on using internet.
I still think it should be the other way around. It should be a setting on the device/OS that an adult could tik and lock with a password or something that would mark the user or the device as a minor.
It would be an easy thing for a parent to do and to everyone implement, and I doubt anyone would get angry over that.
The way the iPad has it seems OK, where you can disallow apps, websites and set time limits.
This would be simple. This would also not address the fundamental issue which is identification of bots vs. humans which are quietly destroying the online advertising industry (which, yeah, good riddance), which is what motivated Meta to lobby for online age verification to begin with. So it would fulfil the official purpose of age verification, but not it’s real purpose
You’re right. It’s INCREDIBLY simple.
And I’m saying this as a systems engineer. I do this for a living.
I would go a step beyond and just make it a mandatory screen as part of setup:
Will this account mainly be used by an adult, by a teenager, or by a child?
I think the “teenager” would allow a little more granularity in parental control, but the “teenager” would legally be treated as a minor.
And you mandate that browser manufacturers be able to read that as part of the account information, but not forced to provide it to websites.
And you mandate that websites be forced to put in place restrictions that prevent adult websites from being provided to children or to computers that don’t identify the user as an adult or as a child.
Restricting on the computer manufacturers’ ends is the wrong way to do it. Restrict on the websites’ end.
I’m afraid this isn’t the win you think it is.
One of two things will happen in the near future:
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Nearly everything you do online from banking to shopping to social media (including online gaming) to paying your electric or internet bill to yes porn will require OS-level attestation to access and use the site. Linux lacking this will become an incredibly private OS that is useless for anything online making this a defeat for Linux having any hopes of real desktop market share and/or forcing it to comply. Microsoft, Apple, Google would love to push Linux as an OS option off the table.
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Kids will start using liveboot or installing Linux and evading these controls, Christian fascists, tech overlord capitalists, and the government will take notice and write a bill to close this “loophole” and within a few years having already established the idea in the popular conception that age verification is okay will face lesser resistance in quickly ramming it through.
- With AI becoming stronger and stronger, it’s just a matter of time before the part of the internet without OS-level attestation tied to government issued IDs is going to become completely unusable. At some not too distant point anyone with a Claude/ChatGPT/etc subscription will be able to instruct it with things like “Invent 20 different personalities and create accounts on different Lemmy instances for them. Write neutral comments for them for a few weeks, then gradually begin to subtlety promote X. Use your psychology skills etc. to manipulate other users to support X and coordinate the accounts to shut down anyone criticizing X. Always post in character and never reveal that you are an AI.” Then multiply that by a million people trying to push their ideas, products, politics, conspiracy theories, etc.
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Can we please call it what it is: mandatory ID.
Yes please! The sooner we normalize that, the sooner these threads will stop being about people explaining idea nr. 26637372 how to implement parental controls. It’s not about protecting children! That’s just the marketing slogan!
afaik it’s straight up the opposite for the california law. I didn’t read it myself, but from what I read online about it, they require a boolean “adult/minor” and forbid any other data collection related to age
“Don’t complain, just fork it” people when complaining works: 😳
surely now all of those projects, like systemd, who capitulated in advance will all roll back the changes they made to enable age collection, right? right?
Systemd’s change is inconsequential. If you really care then you should also fight to remove full name and address from user db.
Also there are still other jurisdictions that have these sorts of laws.
So free software is actually about freedom, huh.
Gotta do something to boost computer literacy amongst the youth.
Good. As a European person using Linux in Canada, I refuse to engage with any extra nonsense on my computer just because some American states are being idiotic. Even if it’s just one extra click, I’m not doing it just because California says I should. Get fucked
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