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ryandrakeyesterday at 8:12 PM1 replyview on HN

> The fundamental question that needs answering is: should we actually prevent minors below the age of X from accessing social media site Y?

This is only an interesting question if we can prevent it. We couldn't prevent minors from smoking, and that was in a world where you had to physically walk into a store to buy cigarettes. The internet is even more anonymous, remote-controlled, and wild-west. What makes us think we can actually effectively age gate the Internet, where even Nobody Knows You're A Dog (1993)[1].

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_...


Replies

Aurornisyesterday at 10:39 PM

> We couldn't prevent minors from smoking,

Smoking rates among minors have plummeted and continue to decline.

That's not really a good example because the war on underage smoking has been a resounding success.

Yeah we didn't stop every single minor everywhere from ever smoking at any time, but the decline was dramatic.

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