this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2026
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California introduces age verification law for all operating systems, including Linux and SteamOS — user age verified during OS account setup (www.tomshardware.com)
submitted 3 days ago by Amoxtli@thelemmy.club to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] BennyTheExplorer@lemmy.world 1 point 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago) (1 child)

Yeah, don't get me wrong, this is an insane law. It makes no sense and it is utterly ridiculous and dystopian.

I am just saying, that it is still manageable to continue, we shouldn't give up. We should continue to fight against this law, but we can also realistically keep distributing our software regardless of this law.

I think, the age thing only has to be implemented by the operating system, not by every piece if software. We as app developers can then choose to use an API to age restrict our apps, if we want to.

We just have to make sure our app isn't recognized as an operating system in itself.

[–] BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org 1 point 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

I’m definitely not saying we give up, but this absolutely does impact every developer, not just OS developers. Go read the bill, but here are the relevant parts:

(c) “Application” means a software application that may be run or directed by a user on a computer, a mobile device, or any other general purpose computing device that can access a covered application store or download an application.

(e) (1) “Covered application store” means a publicly available internet website, software application, online service, or platform that distributes and facilitates the download of applications from third-party developers to users of a computer, a mobile device, or any other general purpose computing that can access a covered application store or can download an application.

(f) “Developer” means a person that owns, maintains, or controls an application.

(b) (1) A developer shall request a signal with respect to a particular user from an operating system provider or a covered application store when the application is downloaded and launched.

Based on a very narrow reading of the “covered application store” definition, a personal website that only has applications developed by that person might be able to get around the age bracket request, but the application itself is still covered. As things like itch.io, crates.io, flathub, PyPI, and every package repo.