For Breanna Easton, social media is a lifeline. The 15-year-old lives on a farm in the Australian outback, 60 miles from her closest friends.

Australia’s new law banning social media use for kids under age 16, which went into effect last week, cut Easton off.

“Taking away our socials is just taking away how we talk to each other,” she said.

Breanna’s mom, Megan Easton, agrees that kids need to be protected, but remembers her own childhood in rural Australia. “We might be incredibly geographically isolated but we’re not digitally illiterate and we have taken great measures in our family to make sure that we educate our children appropriately for the world ahead of them. I do think that it is a bit of government overstepping.”

Last week, Australia became the first country to implement a nationwide social media ban.

A social media platform has filed lawsuits, Australian teens have flouted the rules by posting workarounds, parents have been able to blame the law when trying to enforce their own phone-free policies at home, and policymakers in other countries are watching closely.

In this newsletter, we look at Australia’s grand experiment in banning teens under 16 from social media. It’s been less than a week, but it’s not too early to explore the questions on everyone’s mind:

Is this the government overstepping, or is this an example of a national policy to protect teens that will become a global blueprint?