Watching short videos on their smartphones is already part of the daily life of young people, including a large number of students. Short videos offer rich and diverse content, meeting users' demand for new information within minutes or even seconds. These young users not only watch but also make short videos. In this sense, short videos offer a platform for them to express themselves, enabling instant social networking.

However, it must be pointed out that the content of short videos is often mixed, and some might have a bad impact on adolescents who are still too young to tell good from bad.

Earlier this year, the Cyberspace Administration of China launched an anti-addiction mechanism on popular short video platforms. The mechanism restricts the time adolescents can play online, and the contents and services they can access.

Short videos are not all evil. If monitoring platforms, families, schools and watchdogs cooperate, short videos can be an effective tool for young people to acquire knowledge and enjoy healthy entertainment. For this, the monitoring platforms must strengthen content censorship to shield adolescents from inappropriate information and provide them with helpful content. And watchdogs must regulate this industry carefully to standardize its development.

(This is an edited excerpt of an article originally published in People's Daily on July 24）