Meta and YouTube found liable in landmark social media trial

Big Tech is heading into its own smoky “Big Tobacco” years - decades of litigation that ultimately saw hundreds of billions of dollars being paid out in compensation. There was a time that the games industry might have found itself in a similar position, but by continuing to engage it became a far stronger collective body by working together.

The name Jack Thompson still produces a pavlovian response from games people of a certain age - a bombastic US lawyer that generated a boatload of coverage about the dangers of gaming. His position as a lightning rod on fighting nudity in games, painting the Grand Theft Auto as “violence simulators” actually did the industry many favours in the long-run - although it didn’t feel like it at the time. Hindsight is a wonderful gift - because Thompson eventually won NONE of the cases he brought related to gaming, and was kicked out of the legal profession before becoming a teacher, what a character.

But while the games industry was calming the nerves of politicians who had been inadvertently been touched by Thompson’s campaign, or defending itself by offering spokespeople to appear in the media, bodies like the ESRB in the US and previous incarnations of our own Games Rating Authority and UKIE were focused on creating robust ratings systems and demonstrating increased responsibility.

Let’s be proud that the games industry took some of the harsh medicine when it had the chance.

The world of Social Media/Big Tech hasn’t taken the same route - there’s no industry body, and the major players decline interviews and ignore questioning, and now the chickens are coming home to roost.