> The FTC’s $275 million proposed settlement with Epic Games, owner of Fortnite, alleges the company violated the law by collecting personal information from kids under 13 without parental consent and by enabling voice and text chat by default
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2017/10/...
Even if "by default" was the law though that would seem to make things even more theatrical and less pragmatic anyways.
You know, alcohol, weed, and porn companies have managed just fine with user affirmations.
That the FTC would know there is no reasonable way would be a strong indicator it is indeed not a reasonable law. The default is definitely why Fortnite got fined, and is a reasonable reason to be fined, but it doesn’t make the law somehow effective it just makes Fortnite wrong for intentionally violating the law. I.e. they should have be fined but not because the law protects children effectively rather it’s not up to them to decide if it does on their own.
Changing the default will certainly reduce the number of kids who are subject to toxic game chat. FTC knows it, I know it, you know it, and Epic knows it.
perfect is the enemy of good here, the other poster is arguing that because it's not perfect and is easily circumvented that it will have no effect, and, as you said, we all know this isn't true.
Once you climb out of the beginner ranks, literally everyone has found the communication settings and has adjusted them to their preferences.
I agree that most of the time, people don't change defaults. But isn't true for team games in my experience.
For the record, I’m pro games and against pearl clutching game ratings and “for the children” style laws, but I’m also not very sympathetic to big companies profits being a motivation for our lawmakers.
https://recroom.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4426900227735-...
But this is basically the button press the GP was talking about, during sign up (which can be separate from the main sign up on the same device) the kid just says they were born in 1912 and now the mic works. Yes it's compliant with the law but it's the same problem GP was actually talking about - there is no real verification.
Having parental controlled accounts is a nice feature in general though, regardless of the legal requirements. Ultimately things like this come down to making good parenting easier and that can help.
So nothing is stopping them from purposefully getting a chat activated account, that's the point.
Can you quote it please, because I find that surprising.
Fortnite was too blatant with it by doing this with all accounts including ones that had entered young ages but that doesn't mean other apps that follow the entered age are accurate it just means they aren't likely to get fined. Which sure - still fine Fortnite. Knowingly breaking a law because you want to doesn't make you exempt from the law even if the law is useless in practice.
I'd personally like if the law could be made into something more meaningfully verifiable I just don't think there is a reasonable way to do so. E.g. the UK has an opt-in requirement at the ISP level for porn access because "I am 18+" buttons weren't actually doing anything but making a legal bypass. Yet it's both a ridiculously bad solution and still easily worked around anyways.