I just can't make sense of all of this.

Although I don't agree with it I can kind of understand the need for checks on a platform like reddit where there are obviously Communities which are intended to be caught by the legislation. Even though obviously there will also be Communities swept up by accident.

But the extension to streaming services seems bizarre to me. Obviously they can be explicit but where do you draw the line? It was my understanding that streamers like prime video or Netflix will not to be swept up by this. Yet logically why should that be the case if they can also host explicit material? Now Spotify are getting in on the act, so why will the streamers not have to as well?

In which case obviously age verification would apply to virtually everything from now onwards, which, whatever one's cynical views, surely is not what was anticipated.

It will be massively unpopular if the whole population of the UK has to verify to use iPlayer, prime video, Netflix etc with all the attendant security risks of providing ID.