🎬 Instagram's privacy moves

September 20, 2024

Happy ‘Early Closure from Work’ Day. Here’s an interesting stat: A new academic analysis of climate change in cinema found that, of the 250 most popular fictional movies of the past decade, roughly 10% include a scene in which the characters acknowledge global warming.

Some of the movies that did: Tenet, Marriage Story, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, and that zero-emissions classic, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw.

— Geraldine Ndzomo, Chibuike Uzor.

SOCIAL MEDIA
Instagram makes teen accounts private

DALL.E 3

Instagram just made it harder to become a 16-year-old GRWM influencer. Two days ago, the social media app introduced its biggest suite of features to protect minors amid growing pressure from politicians and the public.

The changes will designate all new and existing Instagram accounts set up by users under 18 as “Teen Accounts” and automatically make them private:

  • Anyone under 16 will need approval through the app’s parental supervision tool to change their privacy settings.

  • Parents will also be able to see whom their kids DM (but not the content of messages) and what topics they manually chose to see more of on their Explore pages.

  • Teen Accounts will also feature “Sleep Mode,” which pauses notifications from 10 pm to 7 am.

Luckily, no one ever lies on the internet. But the company says it’s using a few methods, some involving AI, to verify users’ ages—like requiring them to upload images of their IDs or submit a video selfie.

When to expect these changes. Meta plans to roll out these features in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia within 60 days. Teens in Africa and South America can expect Teen Accounts in January 2025, with the update likely to involve other Meta platforms like Threads and Facebook.

Big picture: Instagram and other social media platforms have received more pressure than their underage users’ thumbs. On Tuesday, Tiktok commenced its appeal trial to overturn a law passed by the US Congress that would see the app banned unless it is sold to a US company within a year. Meta is also facing a lawsuit from several US states accusing it of designing apps so kids get hooked. —GN

DIGITS

154%: Estimated increase in online searches related to the definition of gynaecology the week after Barbie premiered in 2023, per a survey from researchers at Harvard Medical School. Why? Spoiler alert for the eighteen people on Earth who haven’t seen Barbie: After Barbie becomes a human woman at the end of the film, she makes an appointment to see a gynaecologist for the first time, as Barbie dolls obviously don’t have genitals. A leap for medicine.

SNIPPETS

  • Sudan’s warring leaders have expressed openness to end the 17-month-long conflict following calls from Pres. Biden to dialogue between both camps. However, neither has outlined specific steps towards peace.

  • Feels like bullying. Tunisian opposition presidential candidate, Ayachi Zammel has been sentenced to 20 months in jail, less than 3 weeks away from the presidential elections. His crime? Allegedly falsifying signatures on his candidacy papers.

  • Worsening situation. The worsening floods in Maiduguri, Nigeria have now seen more than 400,000 displaced as 15% of the city is reported to be underwater.

  • Five contestants from “Beast Games,” MrBeast’s reality competition on Amazon Prime Video, filed a class-action lawsuit alleging they didn’t receive pay and faced unsafe conditions and “a culture of misogyny and sexism.”

  • Bling bling. Gold prices hit a record high of $91,500 per kg on Monday. Bullion value often spikes during periods of volatility and, well, would you just look at the world?

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