Is Social Media going the way of Big Tobacco?
A jury might have just done to social media what courts once did to Big Tobacco.
This week, Meta and YouTube were found liable for deliberately designing addictive products that harmed a young user - a potentially landmark ruling that could shape the industry for years to come.
To quote The Guardian: Meta and YouTube have been found liable for deliberately designing addictive products that hooked a young user and led to her being harmed, a jury ruled on Wednesday. Jurors found the tech companies to be both negligent and having failed to provide adequate warnings about the potential dangers of their products.
The key issue wasn’t just harm - it was the intent. The jury agreed that these platforms were engineered to be addictive, drawing immediate comparisons to the lawsuits that reshaped the tobacco industry. With multiple similar cases lined up against Meta, Google, TikTok and Snap, this could be the start of a much bigger shift. Both Meta and Google are appealing.
Whether this will end with social media platforms having to display grisly addiction warnings is hard to say, but it will be a fascinating few years on that front.
The bad news didn’t end there for Meta this week, which elsewhere was ordered to pay $375 million in damages owing to misleading users over child safety on the platform.
In the short term, nothing really changes for marketers.
Longer term, it’s possible to imagine where this might go:
Tighter restrictions on targeting (especially for vulnerable groups; in her whistleblowing book about Meta last year, Sarah Wynn-Williams talked about how beauty ads could target teenagers vulnerable about their appearance, for instance)
Less visible engagement (likes, comments) to reduce addictive behaviours
Potential changes to feed and recommendation mechanics; focusing more on recency and less on curation, for instance (or in other words, the decline of the “algorithm”)
This is all speculation of course, and I expect Meta, YouTube and others to fight this with all they have. I’ll keep a close eye on this and share more updates when available.
As a whimsical aside, I can’t wait for “Thank you for using Social Media”.
Further Reading:
Elsewhere, OpenAI announced its killing it’s Sora video platform only months after launch, with Disney scrapping its planned $1bn investment.
A jury found that Elon Musk defrauded Twitter investors during the buyout; he’ll likely end up having to pay damages to former shareholders.
And finally, there was some slightly better news for Meta users this week with the announcement that you can reorder carousel tiles on Instagram after publishing. Probably not enough to drown out the negative press, but from a pure functionality perspective its long overdue.
That’s it for this week! I’ll be back next week. If you found this interesting, I would hugely appreciate it if you shared with your friends and colleagues.
If you’re feeling particularly generous and enjoyed this edition, I won’t stop you from buying me a coffee. Otherwise, I’ll see you next time 🫶