She wanted a safer social-media platform for her kids — so she made her own

Natalie Boll was well versed in social media due to her career in film and television, yet the Vancouver parent was still shocked at what kids face when her teen daughter experienced cyberbullying after getting her first phone. 

"My first reaction was just 'Let's go offline... And I deleted everything for me and my daughter at the time," recalled the mom of three.

Boll vowed to find a middle ground, however, after she discovered the decision isolating for herself — losing contacts she'd built over 15 years, she noted — and for her eldest child, who felt unable to connect with friends the way she wanted to.

"I realized it shouldn't be between these platforms that have harmful content, addictive algorithms, performance metrics, these kind of overstimulating feeds" — or complete withdrawl, she said. 

Social media has been in the hot seat lately, with multiple governments aiming to follow Australia's recent ban on social media for those under 16 and a trial against Meta proceeding in New Mexico, in which the state accuses the Instagram and Facebook-parent company of creating an online space where children are targeted for sexual exploitation and of knowing but failing  to disclose the harms young people face on its platforms.

While Canada also has a vocal contingent urging a social media ban for younger users, others are calling for a more nuanced approach.

Working with advisors from Oxford University, Boll has launched Tribela, an alternative social media platform that aims to strike a balance between "digital detox and doomscrolling" by prioritizing user safety and well-being. 

Social platforms are designed for adults, according to Boll, and safety features are then retrofitted for younger users. With Tribela, she began with "safety-by design-protocols."

What does that mean? Automatic content moderation blocks foul language, violent and sexually explicit content, she explained, and users choose what appears on their feeds themselves. It also means no auto-playing videos, endless scrolling, "likes" or follower counts.

"We don't want them on as long as possible. We wanted to create a space where you could come connect with your friends, watch some engaging content and then go live life," Boll said.

Former Ontario Crown attorney Margot Denommé appreciates Tribela taking a preventive approach by directly addressing issues people struggle with when navigating unregulated social media, which she says "is simply not safe."

Denommé, who's written books about digital safety and served as a consultant for Tribela, usually encourages parents to delay having kids join social media "for as long as humanly possible" to get back to play-based childhoods.

"But when they deem it's appropriate for their child to go online, I strongly urge them to look at Tribela as an alternative versus trying to navigate parent controls that we hear time and time again simply don't work," she said from Toronto.

The prospect of having safety-minded social media alternatives is great news, but an age-restriction is still needed, according to Robin Sherk, a parent advocate with Unplugged Canada.