What you need to know:

• After announcing yesterday that YouTube will be included in a ban on under-16s using social media, PM Anthony Albanese committed to spreading the word to fellow heads of state in New York in six week’s time.
• YouTube is fuming (though kids will still be able to use the service to watch videos without logging in/creating an account) and the social platforms now fear “global contagion” as regulators in the UK and EU weigh similar moves. Possibly why YouTube yesterday announced it will rollout AI age verification in the US, and then other markets.
• Locally the platforms have been on an advertising blitz in a bid to underline their role in teenage life and development. They may now have to do likewise in other major markets. It would be no surprise to see some strategic billboard action in New York come 9 September.
• 36 Months has campaigned hard for the ban, and will likewise present at the UN General Assembly, per CEO Greg Attwells.
• 36 Months was co-founded by Nova's Michael 'Wippa' Wipfli – and the breakfast show will broadcast live out of New York for the week-long event, setting up in Andy Lee’s Old Mates bar.
• Attwells acknowledges that brands may fear the risk attached to backing a movement that has political implications.
• But that’s called bravery, he suggests, which the ad industry talks about quite a lot, along with purpose and customer centricity.
• Attwells sees a major opportunity for brands to join the likes of Hyundai, IHG, KitKat and Medibank and shape the solutions to tackle deeper-lying social problems facing their future customers, and their current customers – parents.

Regulatory affairs haven’t typically gone viral on social media. But the local boss of one of the tech platforms caught by Australia’s ban on social media use for kids under 16 has privately expressed fear of “global contagion” as PM Anthony Albanese spreads the word to fellow heads of state in New York via the UN General Assembly in six week’s time.

Greg Attwells, who leads 36 Months, the platform launched by Nova's Michael 'Wippa' Wipfli and Finch founder Rob Galluzzo to try and buy kids three more years before being exposed to Big Tech algorithms, said the campaign group will host an event at the General Assembly, which has been facilitated by the Office of the Prime Minister.

“We’ve got the official letter from him, it’s happening,” said Attwells. “It will be a nice moment to celebrate world first legislation and leadership on this issue on the global stage. There will be other heads of state in attendance.”

He thinks the UK and EU will enact similar legislation, with New Zealand following suite. While the US is unlikely to hinder tech company revenues under the current administration, elsewhere “the dominoes will fall,” per Attwells.

“Big tech is calling this a global contagion risk. They are treating this like a pandemic. They are a very powerful adversary with a collective market cap of $11 trillion. Nobody in the world has deeper pockets or is more culturally and socially embedded – and they don’t want legislation like this to spread.”

They've been on a lobbying and advertising blitz locally, which may now be replicated globally. Either way, YouTube appears to be taking no chances, announcing yesterday that it will rollout AI-based age verification in its US home market, and then to the rest of the world in the hope of heading off that domino effect.

Purpose talk versus walk

Brands backing the 36 Months campaign also have the opportunity to be at the General Assembly in New York. To date, support has been limited to a handful of early movers – Hyundai, KitKat, IHG and Medibank. Attwells said “another very big Australian brand” is close to signing up. “It’s arguably one of the biggest [brands] in this part of the world ... It will be newsworthy.”

But the vast majority of brands have been less willing to walk the talk on purpose.

“Brands talk a lot about being customer-centric. What that really means is caring about the things your customers care about – and this is something that is keeping mums and dads up at night, the powerlessness … They can’t out-parent an algorithm that has been designed to exploit vulnerabilities in young people,” said Attwells.

“Social media reform is a moment – it will come and go. But at 36 Months, our reason for existing is rebuilding the ecosystem around adolescence. So where are the points of failure in the system around teenagers, and what can we do or build to strengthen them?

“So we will continue to lean into healthy teen development, and a lot of brands genuinely care about that, and their brand purpose is connected to it. Of the 147,000 people who signed our petition, 95 per cent of them were women, and I’m assuming, mums, because we are a parent community – and mums are customers, they are the primary decision-makers for household purchases,” he added.

“So for brands that are brave enough to show up, this is a zeitgeist moment. For brands that want to be on the right side of history, this is an opportunity for them to live out their brand purpose in a meaningful way at a pivotal moment in time. The invitation is there.”

He acknowledges that some brands won’t have the stomach.

“It’s about how comfortable people are with risk. You have big tech on one side of the table, it’s playing out in the public square, it feels somewhat political – and that can feel risky for a brand. But I don’t think you can have bravery without risk.

“Brands talk a lot about being brave, and our whole industry wants to celebrate bravery when we try and do that with creativity.  But I don’t think that is how you celebrate bravery. You celebrate bravery by looking at how risky something was, not necessarily how creative it was,” said Attwells.

“36 Months wasn’t creative, it was simple: Just an extra 36 months to get to know yourself before the world does. But it was risky – and the brands that have stepped forward have reputationally waded into a little bit of risk. The ones that haven’t, probably corporate affairs have stepped in…”

News that YouTube has been brought into the ban elicited arguments that it will “cripple Australian business that are advertising responsibly” and that teens will simply skirt age-checks by using virtual private networks – with VPN downloads surging in the UK in recent days after the Online Safety Act came into force, requiring age verification for sites that host adult content.

Australian businesses will probably survive without advertising as much to under-16s, but brands will likely have to rethink some influencer/creator strategies if they are targeting those demographics.

“It will definitely force brands to pivot in terms of how they want to build brand connections with the younger generations, but there are still lots of other ways to do that,” per Attwells.

On whether the legislation will prove effective, Attwells paraphrased Communications Minister Anika Wells: “She said ‘it’s a not a cure, but a treatment plan’. And that is what it is – another important step in that plan. The legislation is squared away and from 10 December, the platforms have to get their act together and set up more effective age gates than what they’ve got currently … they need to just demonstrate that they're taking reasonable steps to deactivate accounts that are under 16, prevent kids signing up who are under 16. How each platform does that is going to differ … but the onus is on them,” said Attwells.

“The reality is no one in the world is doing this. Australia is leading the way and, and that means that our government is having a crack and drawing a line in the sand. There’s a bit of an unfolding process to set things up. But if they need to be adjusted or refined as we go, then they will be.”

Minister Wells also likened the idea of being on social platforms as a teen as "like learning to swim in the open ocean," said Attwells. She then added, “We can't control the ocean but we can police the sharks and … we will not be intimidated by legal threats.”

"And that is just what we are trying to do," added Attwells. "Policing the sharks and trying to make sure we shepherd [young people's] development with a little more intent, and by being a little more deliberate than we have been."

School tools incoming

The legislation has many detractors who argue that a social media ban may do more harm than good. But Erica Thomas, Principal at private girls school Kincoppal in Sydney's Rose Bay, has described the negative impacts of social media on teens as “the most damaging influence I have ever seen” across a 30-year teaching career. She told Mi3 concentration levels are plummeting, with teachers struggling to find a fix; girls are being conditioned to perfectionism from a young age, while boys are being exposed to increasingly extreme violence, toxic influencers and now bot and AI-created highly sexualised images of girls and young women.

But Thomas acknowledged that a huge program of education and infrastructure will be required across society to help teenagers fill the potentially gaping social media hole when the ban comes into effect.

With schools at the front line, 36 Months is working with creative technology firm Nakatomi – spun out of Rob Galluzzo’s production firm Finch seven years go – on a piece of tech that Attwells thinks will help.

“Whatever's going on for a young person, it's going to manifest itself at school – and a school's duty of care used to be between 8am and 3pm while kids were on site. But these days, because of things like social media, that has been blown up and student wellbeing is now a 24/7 challenge for school leaders – things are happening online in bedrooms late at night… parents are expecting schools to get involved … the lines are blurring and that is causing a lot of friction between parents and principals,” said Attwells.

“Schools just lack the ability to track, monitor and manage wellbeing in this new, complex ecosystem. So one of the things that we're doing next is working with New South Wales principals on an intelligent tool that helps schools track, monitor and manage student wellbeing in their ecosystem. We're currently building that tool with Nakatomi. It's super smart across a number of different areas – risky behaviours and substance abuse, self-harm and suicide, eating disorders and body image issues, safety, mental health – a bunch of those risk areas.

“It can track trends and provide principals with early warning signals, the temperature of student wellbeing in their school ecosystem, and allow them to intervene before things escalate to a crisis.”

Brand building jobs

Also in the pipeline is a jobs platform, per Attwells, as 36 Months takes a broader view of systemic issues affecting teens as they grow up.

“There’s a lot of research that connects agency and self-esteem as an adult with getting a job early. So we're looking at developing a jobs platform for teens that doesn't just help young people get their first job, but helps them learn the skills that they need to succeed at it – and also helps employers of young people create a really positive kind of workplace for them.”

Which presents a big, relatively risk-free role for brands to play.

“36 Months is only just getting started – and the role for brands to show up with us is really only just beginning,” said Attwells. “The social media reform campaign was an important first step, but that doesn't define the scope of how we want to show up. That was just an example of one point of failure in the system around teenagers, the age that they were becoming a social media citizen was too young, and so we've delayed that to 16 – and now we're turning our attention to other things.”

In the meantime, for brands with at least some appetite for risk, Attwells is in market with an immediate opportunity: The UN General Assembly in New York, kicking of on 9 September.

36 Months co-founder Michael 'Wippa' Wipfli and Nova Sydney Breakfast presenters Ryan 'Fitzy' Fitzgerald and Kate Ritchie will be taking their show over for the week broadcasting our of Old Mates – the pub launched earlier this year by Australian comedian Andy Lee and backed by long-time collaborator Hamish Blake plus the likes of Pat Cummins Mick Fanning, Patty Mills, Ash Barty and Hugh Jackman.

“They will run it out of Old Mates and connect it to the moment with 36 Months and the United Nations General Assembly. That’s a big tent pole – Australia on the global stage – and we’ll get some new brands involved,” said Attwells.

“We’re pitching that out at the moment.”