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Social media is on trial in Los Angeles. What happens next could change the way they operate.
Inside LA’s superior court, a landmark trial is getting under way. Social media companies are being accused of being addictive by design, a bit like tobacco and cigarettes were in the 1980s.
They’ll face around 22 “bellwether” lawsuits, i.e. test cases, with lawyers considering the testimonies of more than 1,500 people when launching the action.
Opening statements for the first lawsuit will start on Monday, with Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg among the tech execs expected to testify.
Over the years, people have tried to sue the owners of Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok and Snapchat for online harm, but they’ve largely failed.
Often, social media companies will rely on a defence called Section 230 of America’s Communications Act, which protects online platforms publishing third-party content.
It says they’re not responsible for content posted by users on their platforms.
So what makes this court case so different?
For the first time, social media companies will face a trial by jury.
Those jurors won’t decide whether specific content on the platforms was harmful. Instead, they’ll decide whether social media companies were negligent when they created and tweaked their products to encourage people to spend more time on them.
Social media companies are on trial in Los Angeles over accusations they harmed young people’s mental…
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