Time to clean up the social media mess

The internet and mobile media have been described as the defining technologies of our age, and with them have come undisputable benefits for societies. They spread knowledge, encourage inquiry and debate, and save lives.

But, as with many other age-defining technologies, they have produced consequences unintended by the likes of Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and, somewhat earlier, Alan Turing, the Second World War codebreaker widely accepted as the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence.