I watched him walk into the Los Angeles courthouse and noticed two people at his side wearing Meta Ray‑Ban glasses. The judge stopped the room and warned anyone recording with AI eyewear to delete footage or face contempt. The courtroom was a pressure cooker; every glance and pause felt like evidence.
I’ll tell you what mattered in those minutes on the stand, why the glasses became the smallest scandal and the biggest signal, and what this case could mean for Instagram, Meta and every platform that feeds attention into young mouths. You don’t need me to hand you answers — but I will point out what to watch next.
Two people at the door wore Meta Ray‑Ban glasses.
Judge Carolyn Kuhl told the courtroom that anyone recording with AI glasses would be held in contempt — and ordered deletion if footage existed. That warning hit like a red line drawn in concrete, and reporters from Forbes, CNBC and CNN picked up the moment.
Can you record in a California courtroom?
Short answer: not without permission. California Superior Courtrooms generally prohibit recordings, and the judge made clear she would enforce the rule. You should assume any attempt to stream or secretly film will be met with consequences.
Those Ray‑Ban frames are controversial because they make recording portable and discreet, even though a light is supposed to indicate when they capture video. Whether anyone actually recorded inside the room is unclear. What is clear is the optics: two people with wearable cameras at a high‑stakes trial gives people something to gossip about even before testimony begins.
Mark Zuckerberg took the stand and answered questions under oath.
Zuckerberg sat in the witness chair while lawyers pressed him about whether Instagram was engineered to hook young users. Internal slides from 2015 showing millions of U.S. Instagram users under 13 became a focal point in questioning.
Did Zuckerberg admit Instagram is addictive?
He didn’t concede addiction. He offered guarded replies — “I’m not sure what to say to that,” was one of them — and emphasized policy choices, like why Instagram began asking for age in 2019. The company has said it balanced privacy concerns before changing how it asked for users’ ages.
I watched the exchange and felt the tactics: defense counsel trying to reframe product decisions as privacy‑first, while plaintiffs’ lawyers turned internal memos into proof of design intent. Adam Mosseri, Instagram’s head, has testified in similar veins, calling extreme usage “problematic” but resisting the label of clinical addiction.
Kaley, the plaintiff, is not in court today but her lawsuit is the engine behind the hearing.
She claims she joined Instagram at age 9 and became addicted; her case is one of more than 1,500 similar suits pending against platform companies. Some defendants — Snap and TikTok — settled before trial; others remain.
What does Meta say about teen safety?
Meta told outlets including Gizmodo that it disagrees with the allegations and will show evidence that Kaley faced mental‑health challenges before she used Instagram. The company also points to steps it has taken: Teen Accounts, parental controls and research partnerships it says have guided product changes.
The stakes are legal and reputational. A jury verdict against Meta would ripple beyond one plaintiff: it could change how platforms design feeds, rank content and collect data on minors. You should read the statement and then watch how jurors react to technical testimony about algorithms and engagement metrics.
The courtroom drama is also a story about attention, design and responsibility.
The jurors will be asked whether Instagram was a substantial factor in Kaley’s struggles; that question will hinge on internal documents, testimony from executives and behavioral evidence. The pace of the trial — and the testimony from Zuckerberg and others — will shape how future cases are argued.
I have one practical piece of advice: follow the slides, not the soundbites. Documents from 2015 showing under‑13 usage, CEO coaching notes about media responses, and internal guidance on talking points all tell a more detailed story than headlines do. The plaintiff’s lawyers used those slides to argue design intention; Meta countered by pointing to tools and external research it says demonstrates care for young users.
Meanwhile, the media ecosystem around the trial — reports from CNBC, CNN, BBC, Forbes and the AP — will keep retelling parts of this story in slightly different tones. You’ll see claims about addiction, defenses about privacy choices and a steady drip of internal documents. My bet is you’ll learn more from the pattern of disclosures than from any single answer given on the stand.
Platforms named in related suits — YouTube, Snap and TikTok — sit in the wake of this trial. Some settled early; others remain under scrutiny. For any company that designs to maximize attention, this case is both a legal test and a cultural one.
I’m watching the testimony unfold and tracking the signals Meta sends when its CEO speaks under oath, and I want you to notice the same thing I do: language matters, timing matters, and jurors respond to detail. Which line of argument will persuade a jury more — a claim that millions of underage accounts existed before an age gate, or the defense that mental‑health issues predated social media use?
If you were on that jury, which evidence would move you most?