Six months on, Australian teenagers react to the social media ban

(10 Jun 2026) RESTRICTION SUMMARY: ++MUSIC CLEARED FOR USE++ ASSOCIATED PRESS Sydney, Australia – 4 June 2026 1. Various of young people on phones ASSOCIATED PRESS Sydney, Australia – 29 May 2026 2. SOUNDBITE (English) Timothy Koskie, The University of Sydney: ++STARTS ON SHOT 1 AND PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 3++ "This is the beginning of something. What we talk about in sociology is something called ‘network effects’. Basically, the more people that are on it, the more people are on it, the more people that aren’t on it, the more people aren’t on it. So, we can hopefully start to see the opposite starting to happen, where increasing numbers of kids, increasing groups of kids are not in that space.” ASSOCIATED PRESS Sydney, Australia – 4 June 2026 3. Young people seated on bench 4. SOUNDBITE (English) Tatijana Dagarin, 16, social media user: ++STARTS ON SHOT 3 AND PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 5++ "I think parents have a really big responsibility to make sure they know what their kids are seeing online and make sure, like, their kids are not on social media too young. Or they could set up parental restrictions or something and apps have a big responsibility that some of them, especially Instagram, aren’t doing (enough) to monitor what is shown on the platforms. Like, there’s so many videos of people just dying and no one does anything about it. I think something that did have a big impact on, like, what kids are seeing and how much time they were spending on social media was definitely the ban in schools. So, I think more things like that are actually more tangible are much more helpful.” 5. Various of young people on phones, watching social media videos 6. SOUNDBITE (English) Ilias Patrikios, 16, social media user: ++STARTS ON SHOT 5 AND PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 7++ "Stop bad stuff from going on social media and then they won’t experience it. Like, why is it there in the first place?” 7. Mid of young people on phones 8. SOUNDBITE (English) Ela Menon, 16, social media user: ++STARTS ON SHOT 7 AND PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 9++ "I don’t know, they should crack down on the companies not the actual young people. They should make the companies do better and get fines if they don’t.” 9. Various of young people on phones STORYLINE: In a world-first Australia banned social media for children younger than 16 six months ago. It covered multiple platforms including Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Threads, Tik Tok, X (formerly Twitter) and YouTube with companies facing fines of up to 49.5 million Australian dollars if they failed to take reasonable steps to remove the accounts of Australian children younger than 16. The effect of the ban as far as these young Australians are concerned, is clear. “It’s not working,” they say in unison. But for some experts, despite the now well documented difficulties in preventing children from opening accounts on the banned platforms, the positives are starting to show. "This is the beginning of something," said Timothy Koskie of the University of Sydney's School of Media and Communication. "What we talk about in sociology is something called ‘network effects’. Basically, the more people that are on it, the more people are on it, the more people that aren’t on it, the more people aren’t on it.” For 16-year-old Tatijana Dagarin she felt social media companies and parents should be doing more to stop children coming across harmful content. "Apps have a big responsibility that some of them, especially Instagram, aren’t doing to monitor what is shown on the platforms." Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...