A Utah high school student, Hannah Zoulek, has joined a lawsuit, fighting to block Utah’s vague social media law from taking effect on March 1.

The Social Media Regulation Act requires platforms to verify user ages and then obtain parental consent for minors under 18 to maintain accounts. Once granted access to platforms, minors must be blocked from search results, and no ads can be displayed on their account. Platforms granting access will accept liability for designing any features that the state considers to be addicting or harmful to minors. The law also imposes a curfew blocking minors from accessing platforms between 10:30 pm and 6:30 am.

Because the law “fails to define what constitutes ‘physical, mental, emotional, developmental, or material harms,’ or what degree of harm gives rise to liability,” platforms are left to “guess as to what behavior crosses the line,” the complaint said. A platform may be ruled to be causing harm if a teenager gets a headache after scrolling for too long or becomes upset after friends don’t like a selfie, the complaint said, “nobody knows.”

All of this, the lawsuit alleges, “creates a vague and virtually unlimited form of ‘addiction’ liability (where harm is presumed) that will vastly curtail the available online spaces for teens.” Many platforms might restrict minor access entirely to avoid “crushing civil penalties.” That includes a fine of $250,000 for each feature found to cause addiction, as well as up to $2,500 per minor found to be harmed.

“The vagueness means state officials (and even private plaintiffs) possess unlimited subjective discretion to decide whether a provider’s content publication practices cross the line,” the lawsuit said.

Social media law is “well-intentioned” but “misguided”

Zoulek is a queer-identifying high school student who uses social media to communicate with other members of their school’s robotics club, as well as with friends and “other communities to which they would not otherwise have access,” the complaint said. They sometimes use a cane and have consulted social media forums like Reddit in the past to answer questions about disability access when traveling to unknown places.

In a joint statement with attorneys at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), Zoulek said that they’re concerned that the state is “making it harder to talk with people who have similar experiences” and that the law “just makes it even more difficult” for teens to access beneficial resources online.

Before the Social Media Regulation Act was passed, Zoulek testified before the Utah House Judiciary Committee, “citing their concerns about the law’s infringement on teens’ speech and ability to discuss important issues such as mental health.” Despite testimony from opposing stakeholders, lawmakers pushed the law through, after Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes—charged with enforcement and a defendant in the lawsuit—said that “positive aspects of social media” do not outweigh “substantial evidence” of “extremely harmful” effects of usage.

Reyes’ office declined Ars’ request to comment.

Zoulek’s lawsuit pointed out that the US surgeon general, in a 2023 advisory, said that “due to major gaps in research,” “it is impossible to generalize the effects” of minors’ social media use as either extremely positive or negative.

“Different children and adolescents are affected by social media in different ways, based on their individual strengths and vulnerabilities, and based on cultural, historical, and socio-economic factors,” the advisory concluded.

This law is “well-intentioned” but “misguided,” the complaint said. By striving to protect some minors under certain circumstances from becoming addicted to or harmed by social media, Utah risks unconstitutionally suppressing youth speech while gathering sensitive data on minors and potentially blocking access to resources and experiences shown to be beneficial to mental health.

“Some research suggests that the isolation that results from disconnecting teens from social media may be more harmful to their self-esteem and well-being than is heavy use of social media,” the complaint said.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1996850

For the third time in less than a year, film studios with copyright infringement complaints against a cable Internet provider are trying to force Reddit to share information about users who have discussed piracy on the site.

In 2023, film companies lost two attempts to have Reddit unmask its users. In the first instance, US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler ruled in the US District Court for the Northern District of California that the First Amendment right to anonymous speech meant Reddit didn’t have to disclose the names, email addresses, and other account registration information for nine Reddit users. Film companies, including Bodyguard Productions and Millennium Media, had subpoenaed Reddit in relation to a copyright infringement lawsuit against Astound Broadband-owned RCN about subscribers allegedly pirating 34 movie titles, including Hellboy (2019), Rambo V: Last Blood, and Tesla.

In the second instance, the same companies sued Astound Broadband-owned ISP Grande, again for alleged copyright infringement occurring over the ISP’s network. The studios subpoenaed Reddit for user account information, including “IP address registration and logs from 1/1/2016 to present, name, email address, and other account registration information” for six Reddit users, per a July 2023 court filing.

In August, a federal court again quashed that subpoena, citing First Amendment rights. In her ruling, Beeler noted that while the First Amendment right to anonymous speech is not absolute, the film producers had already received the names of 118 Grande subscribers. She also said the film producers had failed to prove that “the identifying information is directly or materially relevant or unavailable from another source.”

Third piracy-related subpoena

This week, as reported by TorrentFreak, film companies Voltage Holdings, which are part of the previous two subpoenas, and Screen Media Ventures, another film studio with litigation against RCN, filed a motion to compel [PDF] Reddit to respond to the subpoena in the US District Court for the Northern District of California. The studios said they’re seeking the information concerning claims they’ve made that the “ability to pirate content efficiently without any consequences is a draw for becoming a Frontier subscriber” and that Frontier Communications “does not have an effective policy for terminating repeat infringers.” The film studios are claimants against Frontier in its bankruptcy case. The studios are represented by the same lawyers used in the two aforementioned cases.

The studios are asking that the court require Reddit to provide “IP address log information from 1/1/2017 to present” for six anonymous Reddit users who talked about piracy on Reddit. Although, Reddit posts shared in the court filing only date back to 2021.

Reddit responded to the studios’ subpoena with a letter [PDF] on January 2 stating that the subpoena “does not satisfy the First Amendment standard for disclosure of identifying information regarding an anonymous speaker.” Reddit also noted the two previously quashed subpoenas and suggested that it did not have to comply with the new request because the studios could acquire equivalent or better information elsewhere.

As with the previously mentioned litigation against ISPs, Reddit is a non-party. However, since the film companies claimed that Frontier had refused to produce customer identifying information and Reddit responded with a denial to the requests, the film companies filed their motion to compel.

The studios argue that the information requests do not implicate the First Amendment and that the rulings around the two aforementioned subpoenas are not applicable because the new subpoena is only about IP address logs and not other user-identifying information.

“The Reddit users do not have a recognized privacy interest in their IP addresses,” the motion says.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1995738

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The evolution of digital marketing isn’t slowing down—and neither should you. Connect with a community of brand pros and content creators at Social Media Week to learn how to keep pace with the trends, challenges and technology. Register now to save 35%.

College football bowl games are steeped in history and tradition, a staple of the sporting calendar for more than a century.

But some fans are beginning to voice their displeasure from the sidelines, with the sheer number of games becoming a particular sticking point. The 2023-24 season boasts a whopping 43 bowl games, with many falling outside the national championship. Even the Rose Bowl, arguably the best-known of them all, is more famous for its parade than the game itself.

That all changed one cold December night last year when an anthropomorphized toaster pastry named Strawberry was lowered into a giant toaster at Camping World Stadium in Orlando, Fla. Cooked up by the marketing gurus at Pop-Tarts, this was the first-ever edible mascot in sports history, with the Kansas State Wildcats tearing into it after the game.

Pop-Tarts is no stranger to entertainment. The short-lived 1966 Batman Kellogg’s comics series helped the brand become a childhood favorite, and its sustained popularity has paved the way for a Jerry Seinfeld-starring Netflix film in the works, Unfrosted: The Pop-Tart Story.

Strawberry’s stunt catapulted Pop-Tarts into the mainstream once more. But the mascot’s short yet glorious life goes beyond simply a trending topic. The Pop-Tarts Bowl is a pop culture phenomenon that brought out the best of social media and, in doing so, baked the brand into football and marketing lore.

It’s a touchdown

Whether it’s Duke’s Mayo or Chick-fil-A Peach, the college football scene is a welcome home for food and drink sponsors. But a brand name alone isn’t enough to cut the mustard.

While whimsical, Strawberry wasn’t a random, shot-in-the-dark attempt at driving brand awareness. Pop-Tarts’ publicity stunt is forecast to earn the brand more than $12 million in exposure, which stems from following the well-known, well-worn recipe of The Hero’s Journey:

• An ordinary, inanimate pastry hears the call to adventure and becomes Strawberry, now life-sized and full of life through supernatural aid
• Strawberry’s transformation begins as challenges and temptations abound, like almost being licked by a football player
• Strawberry meets the abyss, a martyr figure experiencing death at the hands and mouths of the victors
• And finally rebirth, as a meme that will live on, finding new life as people make Strawberry’s story their own (and Pop-Tarts leaders hint we’ll see the mascot again soon)

The Pop-Tarts Bowl serves as a good reminder to trade in evoking emotion and connection; sometimes it’s the simple story templates and archetypes that pop.

Drawing up the perfect play

When a marketing campaign generates this much buzz, it’s only a matter of time before someone brings out the cookie cutter.

However, the luster was already lacking when Cheez-It unveiled its non-edible mascot on New Year’s Day. While the same agency and marketing minds might be behind both (Pop-Tarts parent company Kellanova is a spinoff of Cheez-It maker Kellogg’s), the reality is that the bit is already old.

Strawberry’s ascendance at the Pop-Tarts Bowl was pure. Nobody saw it coming. It followed the marketing mantra of my former boss, Odwalla and Califia Farms founder Greg Steltenpohl: Show up when and where you’re never expected to be. That’s why he used to run print ads for orange juice in fishing magazines in the ’80s.

Incongruity and absurdity run through the heart of the Strawberry fanfare. The mascot’s twisted facial expression, the implicit (somewhat tongue-in-cheek) agreement that he was going to “die” at the end of the game. Its nihilistic tone played a major part in the stunt catching fire among audiences.

Flip the coin, and it’s the absence of that “Are they really doing this?!” factor that made Cheez-It’s copycat attempt fall a little flat.

A quick glance at the stats reveals that Pop-Tarts’ bowl shenanigans generated oodles of social currency; ESPN’s TikTok of Strawberry has racked up more than 4 million views, and Kellanova’s CMO confirmed it’s the single biggest earned-media campaign the brand has had.

Time to run the option

The bowl season may be over, but brand marketers are already on the clock to come up with next year’s Strawberry.

Let’s hope we all remember the most poignant lesson Strawberry taught us: It’s in the end that many things become meaningful. So let it end and don’t be a copycat.

Instead, let’s ask: Does our brand have a play within its unique personality that can follow the recipe of equal parts absurdity and simplicity? Where can we go where we’re not expected to be?

https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/edible-pop-tarts-bowl-mascot-lessons-marketing/

Learn tricks and tactics to supercharge your social media by joining our free webinar “The 2024 Social Media Trends to Get You More Followers & Sell More Products.” This power-packed session will be led by Entrepreneur’s very own VP of Social Media, Sana Ali.

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Sana Ali is the VP of Social Media Marketing at Entrepreneur Magazine. Throughout her career, she has led global social media campaigns for notable brands, including MTV, iHeartRadio, BET, and WWE. Sana’s expertise lies in her ability to build social influencer products, create social monetization opportunities, and craft effective strategies. Her focus is on fostering audience engagement, delivering measurable results, and leveraging content trends in the ever-evolving social media landscape, particularly by tapping into multicultural audiences.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/science-technology/free-webinar-january-11-the-2024-social-media-trends-to/466939

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/science-technology/why-vanity-metrics-dont-translate-to-business-success/465971

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/science-technology/5-tips-to-grow-your-x-followers-from-0-to-10000/465205

This week, some of the biggest tech companies found out that Section 230 immunity doesn’t shield them from some of the biggest complaints alleging that social media platform designs are defective and harming children and teen users.

On Tuesday, US district judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled that discovery can proceed in a lawsuit documenting individual cases involving hundreds of children and teens allegedly harmed by social media use across 30 states. Their complaint alleged that tech companies were guilty of negligently operating platforms with many design defects—including lack of parental controls, insufficient age verification, complicated account deletion processes, appearance-altering filters, and requirements forcing users to log in to report child sexual abuse materials (CSAM)—and failed to warn young users and their parents about those defects.

Defendants are companies operating “the world’s most used social media platforms: Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, Google’s YouTube, ByteDance’s TikTok, and Snapchat.” All of these companies moved to dismiss the multi-district litigation entirely, hoping that the First Amendment and Section 230 immunity would effectively bar all the plaintiffs’ claims—including, apparently, claims that companies ignored addressing when moving to dismiss.

“Defendants were adamant that the entirety of the complaint should be dismissed under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 and the First Amendment,” Gonzalez Rogers wrote.

Under the 9th Circuit’s three-part test to see if Section 230 applies, tech companies must prove that (1) they are providers of an interactive computer service, (2) whom plaintiffs seek to treat as a publisher or speaker, and (3) of information provided by another information content provider.

Plaintiffs argued that the second prong wasn’t met because their complaint was allegedly entirely aimed at how platforms were designed—not at content published by platforms—and tech companies argued that all prongs were met because all the alleged harms allegedly stemmed from content on their platforms.

Gonzalez Rogers found that both sides’ “all or nothing” approaches to the motions to dismiss did “not sufficiently address the complexity of the issues facing this litigation” or “fairly or accurately represent the Ninth Circuit’s application of Section 230 immunity.”

Gonzalez Rogers’ ruling sheds new light on how courts interpret the scope of Section 230 immunity. She wrote that “the issue is whether the defendant’s alleged duty to the plaintiff could ‘have been satisfied without changes to the content posted by the website’s users and without conducting a detailed investigation.'”

While platforms hoped she would find that none of their duties could have been satisfied without those conditions being met, Gonzalez Rogers identified nine alleged design defects that “do not implicate publishing or monitoring of third-party content,” “are not equivalent to speaking or publishing,” and “can be fixed by defendants without altering the publishing of third-party content” and “thus are not barred by Section 230.”

Alleged defects not barred by Section 230 include: not providing effective parental controls; not providing options for young users to self-restrict time used on the platform; making it challenging for users to delete their accounts; not using robust age verification; making it challenging for users to report predators and inappropriate content; offering appearance-altering filters; not labeling filtered content; the timing of notifications alleged to increase addictive use; and not implementing “reporting protocols to allow users or visitors of defendants’ platforms to report CSAM and adult predator accounts specifically without the need to create or log in to the products prior to reporting,” the order said.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1984148

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Reddit ignited a war this year. Dramatic changes in API access pricing (from free to unaffordable) was one of its most polarizing moves ever. It resulted in apps beloved by long-time Reddit users, including moderators and people with accessibility needs, closing shop. Community trust was sacrificed, too. Disgusted with Reddit for how it handled third-party apps, abruptly ushered in pricing changes, and treated moderators who protested, numerous valuable, knowledgeable users quit the platform.

Originally, Reddit framed its API pricing changes as a way to prevent generative AI companies from using Reddit data to train large language models (LLMs) without Reddit getting anything in return. With Reddit no longer dealing with small third-party developers—all of which are now either paying Reddit or getting some sort of exemption—Reddit is reportedly taking the fight to where it should have been focused the entire time: generative AI firms.

Can Reddit survive without search?

On Friday, The Washington Post, as spotted by The Verge, said Reddit “has met with top generative AI companies about being paid for its data,” citing an anonymous source.

Going further, The Washington Post reported that Reddit is ready to play hard ball:

If a deal can’t be reached, Reddit is considering blocking search crawlers from Google and Bing, which would prevent the forum from being discovered in searches and reduce the number of visitors to the site. But the company believes the trade-off would be worth it, the person said, adding: “Reddit can survive without search.”

It sounds like a drastic, if not unrealistic, move, but these are drastic, if not surreal, times. The generative AI boom has been so breakneck that companies everywhere are now scrambling to figure out how the technology can best be monetized to favor their best interests.

At first, we might have thought that Reddit would only consider blocking AI crawlers, but The Washington Post’s report specifically states “search crawlers.” And Google and OpenAI have already released ways to block their AI data crawlers.

This suggests that Reddit’s reported threat to block Google and Bing isn’t just about protecting Reddit data from being used freely to train AI, but also about giving Reddit an advantage in the overall negotiations.

Google has already had a taste of what a Reddit-free Google might look like. In June, thousands of subreddits went dark, read-only, or only allowed joke posts that included but were not limited to John Oliver. This made the strategy of appending “Reddit” to Google search terms useless, and this was reportedly noticed by Google.

That month, CNBC cited an audio recording of a company meeting where Google SVP Prabhakar Raghavan was asked about Reddit protests impacting search results. The executive reportedly conceded that Google users were unhappy.

“Many of you may wonder how we have a search team that’s iterating and building all this new stuff and yet somehow, users are still not quite happy,” Raghavan said at the time, according to CNBC.

Google seemingly knows that its users are interested in Reddit results because they provide real human answers and insight. This has become particularly valuable as Google’s search results have become more sponsor-driven over the years and as unreliable sites game SEO. Demand for real human voices is why Google launched the Perspectives tab on its search engine, but that also brings up the likes of TikTok and YouTube influencers and sponsored posts. That’s different from a passionate discussion giving you rare insight based on real-life experiences.

Of course, blocking search could be a bluff from Reddit. It’s hard to imagine a world where Reddit’s relevance remains as strong if it requires users to visit its homepage. In June, Digiday cited Similarweb as saying 49 percent of Reddit’s traffic comes from search engines. That’s not an unrealistic number for a modern website, but Reddit hasn’t confirmed this data.

That said, Reddit has made some dire moves before. The social media firm is said to be considering an IPO this year and has been relentless lately in its pursuit to become profitable and to diversify revenue streams beyond ads. Besides forcing the closure of some of the most popular ways to access Reddit, the company recently forced personalized ads and started a user payment program similar to what social media site X (formerly Twitter) has implemented.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1977935