The judge overseeing the social media addiction case in California told the jury to continue to use the platforms at the center of the trial that began in Los Angeles on Monday.
The first-of-its-kind trial accusing social media companies Meta, which operates Instagram and Facebook, and YouTube of making their platforms harmfully addictive began with opening arguments after weeks of jury selection. Judge Carolyn Kuhl of the Superior Court of California for LA County told the jurors they may continue to use social media but should avoid changing the way they interact with the platforms and not change any settings, per the Associated Press.
The trial is expected to last several weeks and centers on the claims made by a 19-year-old, identified only as K.G.M. in the lawsuit, that she became addicted to the media, blaming that addiction for leading to her depression and suicidal thoughts.
K.G.M.’s lawyer, Mark Lanier, centered his opening statement to the jury on the features the platforms allegedly use to get their users addicted, including endless scrolling.
“This case is about two of the richest corporations who have engineered addiction in children’s brains,” Lanier said, per CNN. “The swipe, for a child, like Kaley, this motion is a handle of a slot machine. But every time she swipes, it’s not for money, but for mental stimulation.”
Lanier also claimed that the case is “easy as ABC,” with those letters standing for “addicting the brains of children,” per the Associated Press, and claimed the media companies’ lawyers will “try to blame the little girl and her parents for the trap they built.”
Both Meta and YouTube have strongly denied the allegations made against them about their platforms being harmfully addictive, also claiming that Section 230, a federal statute that generally protects online platforms from liability for user-posted content, should prevent them from being liable in this case.
SOCIAL MEDIA COMPANIES FACE FIRST TRIAL OVER ADDICTION TO THEIR PLATFORMS
Snap, the owner of Snapchat, and TikTok were also named in the lawsuit, but the two companies settled with K.G.M. for an undisclosed amount ahead of the trial.
Social media and its addictive qualities have been increasingly under the microscope for the past decade, with the heads of social media companies testifying before Congress and platforms making adjustments for younger users, but the trial in LA marks a new step in the scrutiny toward the platforms.
