I became a software engineer because, as a child, I had unrestricted access to computers. I could install and reinstall any operating system I desired as many times as I wanted.

That freedom to experiment, to break things and fix them again, is what taught me how computers actually work. No classroom, no tutorial, and certainly no age-gated platform could have replicated that. These laws wouldn't have protected me. They would have taken that away from me.

Protecting children and limiting their potential are not the same thing.

https://blog.system76.com/post/system76-on-age-verification

Hot take, so controversial it counts as trolling: all notifications should default "off". Anything that can interrupt or distract the person using a computer or other device should be explicitly turned on by that person.

There are exceptions for things that can cause serious harm if ignored. "You've got mail" is not an exception. Neither is "someone liked your social media post".

RE: https://mastodon.social/@heidilifeldman/115918842141108950

I generally agree with what's in this thread, but I think that DHS can be eliminated and replaced with nothing at all.

Preserving the institutions that existed when DHS was created is probably a political necessity, but they can go back to where they were before DHS absorbed them.

Anything that was created along with DHS is either waste, or a weapon of authoritarianism. Usually both.

I am in disbelief that the only argument I'm seeing mobilized against age verification laws (and their accompanying social media bans) is “It sucks for privacy!”, and not “why the fuck are we okay imposing a digital jail on every single child?”

Digital privacy matters and it's an important reason why these laws must be repealed at all costs, but let's also please humanize the issue here: social media bans for minors are just another massive chapter in the conservative's playbook to deprive any social class that's not ‘adult white males’ of their bodily and existential autonomy.

That same playbook has chapters we're already familiar with, including staples such as “let's force gay kids back into the closet”, “trans kids shouldn’t be able to decide anything for themselves”, “women shouldn't have a bank account”, and “abortion should be illegal”.