If you have a favorite mommy vlogger in Minnesota, there’s a good chance that their content creation will shift a little thanks to a new law that went into effect on July 1.
Minnesota lawmakers passed a first-of-its-kind law that prohibits children under the age of 14 from appearing in monetized content on social media platforms. The law also adds regulations for how older minors can participate and be compensated for their appearances in monetized social media content.
William McGeveran, dean of the University of Minnesota Law School, said the new law is a form of child labor protection.
“They set it up as almost a child labor law. It’s not about what you can say. It’s about kids needing to be able to be paid for work that they do,” said McGeveran. “And if they’re 13 and under, kids can’t work in the ice cream shop and they can’t work in their parents’ content creation either. That’s the way the law looks at it.”
Content Creation And Minors
The law states that children 13 and younger can no longer participate in specific monetized social media content. More specifically, it states that minors are not allowed to participate in monetized social media content if they are included in at least 30 percent of the paid video content produced within a 30-day period. Moreover, teenagers 14 and up must be paid revenues from the content they appear in. These revenues are to be put into a trust account that becomes available to them when they turn 18. Finally, the law also states that content creators must remove content featuring minors if the minor asks that the content be taken down at any point after they turn 18.
This will undoubtedly affect some Youtubers and Family Vloggers throughout Minnesota, and it will be interesting to see how content creators shift their content to take their kids out of their videos or ensure they stay below that 30 percent threshold. It seems that there is enough leeway that there will be ways to continue producing content involving children in a more limited and protected basis, and it remains to be seen how the law will be enforced. At the end of the day, it does provide more protections and a potential for future earnings for minors, and that’s a good thing, because although most family vlogger content is harmless, there are undoubtedly some kids that do not want to be involved in content production or are being exploited by not seeing any money from the monetized content they are involved in.
If you run into trouble with the law in a more standard way, like with a speeding ticket, a drug bust or a DUI, let us be a resource for you. Contact Avery and the team at Appelman Law Firm today at (952) 224-2277.
