TikTok settles just before social media addiction trial to begin

TikTok just peaced out hours before jury selection in a headline-making “social media addiction” trial — and the internet instantly lit up. One camp is yelling “Big Tobacco vibes!” as users like augusteo wonder if this is the start of massive, ongoing payouts. Another camp insists TikTok’s being unfairly singled out, with OGEnthusiast pointing at Instagram and YouTube still standing in the ring. Meanwhile, the conspiracy-curious crowd is busy cracking jokes about censorship and withdrawals, with one commenter quipping they were cut off “cold turkey.”

Underneath the memes, people are clocking the timing: Snap settled last week, TikTok now, leaving Meta (Instagram/Facebook) and YouTube (Google) to face jurors over design choices like endless scroll and push alerts. It’s not about what users post — it’s about how the apps are built. That’s a twist even non-tech readers can feel. Some fear a flood of copycat lawsuits (noitpmeder asks what stops everyone else), while others want the courtroom popcorn for Mark Zuckerberg’s expected testimony and those internal docs professors say could spill into open court. Meta says it’s rolled out teen safety tools; skeptics say they don’t work. And yes, Section 230 comes up — but commenters keep dragging it back to money, accountability, and who’s brave enough to face a jury.