Ruby Franke was once certainly one of YouTube's hottest family vloggers, posting videos featuring her husband and 6 children on her channel 8 Passengers, which have garnered over 1 billion views.
In some, she documented her family vacations and family activities, similar to painting together. In other cases, she described banning her 16-year-old son from sleeping in his bedroom for seven months and threatening to behead a stuffed animal.
In August 2023, Franke was charged with child abuse And pleaded guilty 4 months later.
While the crimes that led to the fees, similar to denying her children water and being handcuffed for prolonged periods of time, didn’t appear on 8 Passengers, her children viewed the vlogging as a bigger pattern of abuse.
In October 2024, 21-year-old Shari Franke, Ruby's eldest daughter, testified to Utah lawmakers about what being a baby influencer against her will had done to her.
“I come today as a victim of family vlogging,” Shari said, “to shed light on the ethical and financial issues that come with being a child influencer.” She added, “If I go back and everything If I could do it all over again, I'd rather have an empty bank account right now and not have my childhood plastered all over the internet. “No sum of money I've received has made what I've experienced worthwhile.”
Her testimony took place just weeks after California passed a law It stipulates that a portion of the proceeds from social media content featuring children have to be placed in a trust for the kid after they turn 18.
I’m a Social media researcher Who has spent the last two years advocating for this? for the youngsters of family vloggers. Just 18 months ago, I wrote about how there isn’t a legal protection for influencers' children, regardless that child actors have strict laws protecting their income.
Now that’s starting to vary – but there’s still lots to do.
New laws for a brand new era
Some children have been featured of their parents' social media content go viral as toddlers; other have their first menstrual cycles transmitted into the world; they usually might be pressured by their parents to be the talent that secures her family's financial livelihood.
California has that Coogan lawwhich protects the financial interests of entertainers under the age of 18. However, this was passed in 1939, long before the arrival of social media; Until recently, there was no comparable Coogan Law for the youngsters of family vloggers.
In August 2023, nevertheless Illinois became the primary US state to pass a law to guard the financial interests of youngsters of family vlogging. The bill requires parents to put aside 50% of their income for content during which their child appears. The money must go right into a trust fund that the kid can access after they turn 18. If there isn’t a money for the kid, he can sue his parents.
Minnesota was the following state to pass such a law. in May 2024. This went beyond financial considerations and banned children under 14 from appearing in greater than 30% of their parents' social media content. If children appear in these videos and the videos are monetized, money have to be deposited into an account, just like Illinois.
In December 2023, I consulted with legislators on drafts of California's measure. This bill, which went into effect in September 2024, is comparable to Illinois law but is seen as a vital step in regulating family vlogging content given the state's relationship with the entertainment industry.
Work is figure
These laws will not be aimed toward casual parents who wish to share an image of their child on Facebook or Instagram. They are establishing protections for a type of child labor that until recently had little control.
In the spring of 2024, I provided written testimony to the state of Missouri, which was considering its own law. I identified that there are greater than 500 hours More videos are uploaded to YouTube every minute, TikTok boasts greater than 150 million energetic monthly users within the US alone and Instagram users are watching 17.6 million hours rolls per day. I explained how I've interviewed over 150 content creators and influencers over the past decade – and I often hear them say they've been paid greater than $8,000 per post.
Brand sponsorship stays a gray area in these laws; Most latest laws only cover payments directly from platforms. But I would like to emphasise that we're not talking about just a few extra dollars here and there. It might be enough money to begin a family. And it’s work – for everybody involved.
What's next?
Illinois, Minnesota and California can have passed laws, but elsewhere the difficulty stays.
Washington state attempted to introduce such a bill, and Shari Franke's statement got here as Utah began considering its own laws.
However, I consider that any work to combat the issue of kid social media exploitation requires a holistic approach.
It is significant that children cannot consent to publication of their parents' content. While it is perhaps fun to seem in Mom or Dad's video, young children do not know in regards to the dangers of the Internet. They don't understand that content can transcend the audience. They don't understand that the web is perpetually – that someday after they apply for school or a job, Google search results might show up their baby photos.
In 2023, Maryland attempted to introduce laws that may include the next Right to be forgotten Provisions – an addendum that permits children to request that social media platforms delete content about them after they turn 18. The measure never gained momentum and the bill stalled. But states can take inspiration from the European Union, which has among the strictest right-to-be-forgotten laws on this planet.
Social media platforms also play a job. If they wanted, they might regulate or ban monetized content focused on children. Apart from that, Family vlogging content is a money maker for platforms: It generates billions of views, making the audience stay longer on the hosting site like YouTube or Instagram. One might subsequently assume that platforms would never intervene on their very own initiative if there was a risk that their bottom line can be affected.
But I learned one thing from studying social media platform governance is that public opinion matters. And in my ongoing research into family vlogging, I've seen an enormous shift in public opinion over the past two years. because the press pays more attention to the phenomenon, the content creators and the audience are more critical about it and former children of family vloggers like Shari Franke tell their stories.
If platforms can quickly develop their very own versions of AI chatbots, they’ll create teams to work out how one can regulate and implement family vlogging laws within the US – and, for my part, have the chance to be on the precise side of the history to face.
image credit : theconversation.com