Annoyingly? Ironically? The best technical implementation of this law would be to make it possible for the "device owner" to tell the OS to set a flag that the user was under age. Never send the age, never send anything else. Just have a global variable indicating that the user is under age that can be accessed by the browser.
Now what would happen after that?
First oses would have to implement the above in a way that could not be bypassed, pretty much impossible if the child has access to the device.
Then you would need to require that websites honor that token or any similar token no matter how it was implemented ... https MITM etc. good luck with that.
Finally once all the implementation and enforcement hurdles are complete every website out there would immediately know that the user browsing was a child and all the trackers and ad networks on the web would immediately start targeting those users because children are marks.
Now you need even more laws and regulations to protect the children from being targeted by advertising companies, and good luck with enforcing that.
This is what I was hoping for when I read one of the comments. It's okay if the child can technically bypass the flag. That's what the parent is for, to regularly monitor their child's device. But I am a parent with a technical background so this works for me, selfishly, I have no idea how it will work for everyone else.
But once again, I'd like to bring up my preferred solution for this problem. Ban "smartphone" (precise meaning TBD) for minors in public spaces. My belief is that it will disrupt the dopamine hits enough that it doesn't become addicting and kids don't rely on it completely to function socially. And just having it in legislature will serve as a starting point for parents to discuss the topic more openly, which will help with the network effects. Parents don't have second thoughts on why cigarettes or drugs or alcohol is bad for children, they just are, and whole groups of parents can collectively agree that their children and friends of their children should not be using them. I hope to see the same for "smartphones".
To me, the Hyperion Cantos present a vision of the future that is incredibly hopeful. The path along the way may at times be bleak, and I find the handling of the TechnoCore to reveal echos of the great chain in a work that otherwise seems to totally reject it. Despite those and a few other shortcomings the Cantos are essential guides for charting our way toward a distant future that is filled with warmth, love, and compassion rather than the cold empty void of hate. To receive such a vision is a rare gift. Thank you Dan. Choose again.
To extend the though there, the main question is not if, not when, but how long it will take. Do you bet on 90 years, 90 months, 90 days, 90 hours? Even if the change happens over 90 months (about 7 years) is that enough time to rebuild major shipping ports, forget resettling a substantial portion of the human population.
What you have written (copied from an llm?) is utter nonsense. The publication date for this is 1773, nearly two years before battles in Lexington and Concord start in 1775.
Implicitly assuming that there is some well defined state that can be recovered when turning it back on. That's not how the real world works, and historically what revolutionaries fail to fully realize is that the trajectory out of a period without government is extremely unlikely to wind up in the state that they desire, much less one that was "stored" or "defined" by a set of per-existing laws.
true- the only "revolution" that I'm familiar with that was mostly successful is the American Revolution and even that is probably a misnomer.
Rather than a call for revolution, my comment was a joke- given the technical bent of this forum.
Because turning things off/on again actually works for so many bugs lol
If we could actually do it- it would actually look something like idealized DOGE. Terminate all contracts. Fire everyone minus the absolutely essential employees. Or at least the employees that can't even send an email (minus NOCs?)
Then slowly build back until it needs to be done over again.
This contract seems like another grift. Hopefully I'm wrong.
Oh yeah. A classic awesome site. I read once that the authors of both The Expanse and For All Mankind have cited that site as a source. Probably other hard SF too.
I love the idea of pricing all externalities as time required to be around dangerous animal. I think it would really help make the cost of externalities viscerally real in a way that helps stimulation the imagination :)
Now what would happen after that?
First oses would have to implement the above in a way that could not be bypassed, pretty much impossible if the child has access to the device.
Then you would need to require that websites honor that token or any similar token no matter how it was implemented ... https MITM etc. good luck with that.
Finally once all the implementation and enforcement hurdles are complete every website out there would immediately know that the user browsing was a child and all the trackers and ad networks on the web would immediately start targeting those users because children are marks.
Now you need even more laws and regulations to protect the children from being targeted by advertising companies, and good luck with enforcing that.
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