A state court just wrote Meta's teen product spec for it

State courts are starting to write product specifications, not just fines. Business Insider's Thursday report on a New Mexico ruling against Meta makes the mechanism visible. A judge bound the platform to specific user-facing changes: a 90-hour monthly cap for under-18 users across Facebook and Instagram, like counts hidden by default, push notifications muted for minors overnight and during school, and stronger age verification. The remedy isn't a damages check. It's a product spec.

The $942 million penalty Business Insider reports is the loud part: $375 million from a March jury verdict the judge upheld, plus $567 million he added on Thursday, with $420 million carved out for treatment services. The number is easy to discount as another tech-industry fine. It isn't the mechanism.

They tell a platform engineering team what to ship, and they hand every other state attorney general a litigated template to copy. New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez labeled the order a "blueprint" for other states and countries, which is the official tell that replication is the point.

Meta says it will appeal, and an appellate court can narrow or pause the mandates. The template survives the appeal clock anyway. The next state AG doesn't need to win a jury trial first. They need a sympathetic judge and the New Mexico order in their brief. The fine punishes the company. The product spec punishes the product, and it travels.