First U.S. jury trials on ‘engineered’ child social-media addiction open in LA and Santa Fe

This double-barreled legal opening recalls the 1994–1998 tobacco litigation, when a single Mississippi case and state AG suits cracked an industry once thought lawsuit-proof. Like Big Tobacco, the platforms are accused not of the content itself but of a business model—algorithmic ‘infinite scroll,’ likes, autoplay—optimized for compulsive use despite internal warnings. The trials probe deeper currents: mounting evidence of a post-pandemic youth mental-health slide, bipartisan impatience with Section 230’s broad shield, and a larger global swing toward treating data-driven design as a product safety issue (see the EU’s 2024 DSA or France’s 2025 under-15 ban). Whether the juries side with tech or plaintiffs, the mere fact that Zuckerberg, Mosseri and Mohan must defend design choices under oath signals a pivot point; over a century horizon, it could mark the moment digital attention economics began to face the sort of duty-of-care standards that eventually bound food, drugs and automobiles.