[ropable]

I continue to be broadly in favour of this idea. I agree that there's some wiggle room around the specific age (15 vs 16), but for a population-level change you just need to pick an arbitrary value, implement, and re-assess later. I also acknowledge that 1) online age-gate mechanisms tend to suck, 2) the evidence of harm is weak, and 3) it really should be up to parents to manage at the individual level. But ultimately, I feel that a restriction like this would be a net positive for the mental health of the vast majority of young teens.

Make the change, assess the effects, adjust/repeal as needed (just like everything else). It seems like the kind of change that's well-suited to undoing later, in case of unintended consequences. It's not like we're going to be permanently stunting the growth of an entire cohort or something.