Breaking: Meta and YouTube Found Guilty of Addicting and Harming Teens
In landmark social media addiction lawsuit, a jury of our peers said that social platforms Meta and YouTube caused harm and failed to warn the public
Here are the questions that jurors needed to answer:
Was Meta negligent in the design or operation of Instagram?
Was this negligence a substantial factor in causing harm to Kaley?
Did Meta know that design or operation of Instagram was dangerous when used by a minor?
Did Meta know that users would not realize the danger?
Did Meta fail to adequately warn of the danger?
Would a reasonable platform, designer, or operator, have warned of danger or instructed on safe use?
Was Meta’s failure to warn a substantial factor in causing harm to Kaley?
The answers?
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes.
I will report more on this later today, for interviews with parents and reactions outside the courthouse, follow Nicki Petrossi on LinkedIn.
Update 10:37am PST: Meta and YouTube were both ordered to pay $3M in compensatory damages, and there may be additional punitive damages coming. Stay tuned.
Update 12:30pm PST: Meta (Instagram) was found 70% responsible and Google (YouTube) 30%, jurors are currently deliberating on punitive damages for these $1.5 and $3.5 trillion dollar companies.
Update 1:30pm PST: Meta and YouTube were also ordered to pay an additional $3M in punitive damages.
Guilty as hell
WOOOHOOO!!! 👏 🙌