[HN Gopher] Tech execs who raise their kids tech-free or limit t...
___________________________________________________________________
Tech execs who raise their kids tech-free or limit their screen
time (2020)
Author : evo_9
Score : 126 points
Date : 2022-12-30 16:12 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.businessinsider.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.businessinsider.com)
| axpy906 wrote:
| The number of screen types has increased since I was a child in
| the 90's. We only had TVs. Now kids are exposed to phones,
| tablets, games and watches in addition to the tv. So many
| opportunities and so many more channels as a parent I need to
| block or watch out for.
| donsupreme wrote:
| This shouldn't be surprising. You think McDonald's exec have
| their kids eating happy meals all the time if at all?
| VyseofArcadia wrote:
| I'm sure my bias is showing, but I think my mom's solution worked
| pretty well. No such thing as limiting screen time, but I did
| have limits on the kinds of activities I was allowed to do and
| when.
|
| No video games on school nights. Sunday is fine but only before
| dinner and only if my homework was finished. Computer time was
| limited to half an hour and only if my homework was finished, and
| I could only run whitelisted "educational" software.
|
| No formal limits on TV watching, but in practice my parents had
| grown up shows they wanted to watch that I found boring, so my TV
| time was effectively limited to e.g. when they were busy cooking
| dinner.
|
| No limits for any activity on weekends as long as homework,
| chores, and miscellaneous family activities were done. I thought
| of this as digital pig-out time, and I'm sure my parents thought
| of it as, "do what we want because the kids are playing video
| games" time.
|
| All the above activity limits expired when I got into high
| school. I guess they'd rather me do nerd stuff than getting into
| trouble with drugs, alcohol, or girls. And indeed, I spent this
| time teaching myself C so I guess it worked.
|
| No children of our own yet, but we plan to adopt a similar
| system, with modern internet-connected screens like phones and/or
| tablets lumped into the "computer time" category.
| friend_and_foe wrote:
| I'm guessing you're in your 30s, maybe late 20s, this is how
| most of us grew up. It's not the same anymore.
|
| "Nerd stuff" these days is watching Disney movies and playing
| games. We taught ourselves nerd stuff because we had to dig to
| get to the candy inside. These days you don't have to dig, one
| click install and done, the digging is grinding for loot boxes
| or whatever. A person can use these machines hours a day every
| day of the week for years and not learn a single thing about
| actually operating them, they're kiosks for consumption to most
| people. To learn real nerd stuff requires deliberate effort
| now.
| VyseofArcadia wrote:
| Hit the nail on the head. I'm in my mid-30s.
|
| To learn anything on your own has always required effort.
| I've been driving almost every day for 20 years, and I still
| don't really know anything about cars. My mother-in-law has
| been using a computer every day since 1985, and she knows
| less about computers than I do about cars. "Needing to dig"
| is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for learning.
|
| I feel like the lack of a need to dig is a double-edged sword
| if anything. I knew I wanted to program the computer, but I
| had to scour the card catalog at the library for anything
| related to computers to find anything at all, and most of
| what I found was about BASIC. Now? It's a click away. On the
| other hand, I know where to look for information, how to read
| the docs, etc.
| rwbt wrote:
| Just an observation, I'm a parent of two toddlers and try to
| limit screen time as much as possible. But if we ever go to my in
| laws or relatives places they always have a TV blaring in the
| background. I try not to make a fuss about limiting TV or screen
| time when we're visiting but they do know my views on screen
| time.
|
| They are completely fine giving iPads and allowing kids to watch
| YouTube for hours. I have no idea what it's effects are long term
| but their kids seem to be doing ok in school so far.
| [deleted]
| orwin wrote:
| I'm not a professionnal, but i've worked with kids for years
| before going into CS and development, and i have a surpising
| advice:
|
| Screen are OK.
|
| What you want is your kid to experiment. Constantly, with
| different things. Even doing nothing for some time can be
| stimulating, if you're with them. TV, radio, music on the
| background is a good idea (maybe mixing the medias a bit).
| Having stuff to look at (animated images!) is nice.
|
| The danger is cutting off social relationships and contact, and
| as long as you're present, this won't happen.
|
| And consider youth summer camps.
| a-dub wrote:
| my childhood had computers that had lots of rough edges and
| required a lot of problem solving in order to just get them
| to function.
|
| i can't help but wonder if today's tech gadgets that both
| work consistently, have beautifully polished ux and are
| geared towards consumption deny kids this kind of skill
| development opportunity.
|
| that said, the scope and scale of free learning resources
| available today is really mind boggling.
| elteto wrote:
| When I grew up screens were still green and Paratroopers
| was an amazing game. The level of experiential "complexity"
| was very low compared to what we have today: supercomputers
| in every pocket capable of displaying hyperrealistic
| experiences, that are, on top of everything else, carefully
| optimized to create addictive habits. Kids today don't have
| a chance.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| > _i can 't help but wonder if today's tech gadgets that
| both work consistently, have beautifully polished ux and
| are geared towards consumption deny kids this kind of skill
| development opportunity._
|
| Certainly the case. Watching inane youtube videos on an
| ipad won't teach you anything more about technology than
| being a couch potato in front of a TV. Using a
| technological artifact is not intrinsically educational.
|
| I've heard plenty of stories about _" I was a gamer and
| that's why I learned how to use computers"_, but those
| stories are from a time when getting a game to run required
| troubleshooting, finding and reading informational
| resources, etc. The iOS appstore isn't teaching any of
| this.
| a-dub wrote:
| although i suppose those who have the opportunity and
| aptitude these days can get that same sort of experience by
| fighting with things like python package dependencies.
|
| the problem of access inherent in what seems to be a slow
| death of microcomputers remains though...
| superkuh wrote:
| "screen time" limits, as if all screens were exactly the same, is
| such a bogus concept. Screens are not inherently bad, or good, or
| anything anymore than a window is bad or good. Or any rectangular
| slice of field of view...
|
| It's mass hysteria behavior much like prior generation's freak-
| outs over printed newspapers, radio, or television. If you want
| to have limits for time spent on youtube do that. The screen
| isn't the problem.
| fullshark wrote:
| I'm guessing you don't have kids and haven't seen what happens
| if you tell them to put down the phone/iPad cause it's time to
| do X, then watched them bargain with you for the device back.
| It's like seriously like talking to a drug addict.
| sanderjd wrote:
| This is totally right, but I think the majority of people
| understand this, and use "screen time" as shorthand for
| completely passive and solitary use of screens. I know many
| people really do say it is the screen itself that's the
| problem, but I don't think that's the most common colloquial
| use of the term.
| 0xcde4c3db wrote:
| I suspect that the focus on "screen time" originally came about
| because the genre of low-effort studies that try to squeeze
| headline-grabbing correlations out of "time spent watching TV"
| needed to switch to a broader measure because conventional TV
| has dramatically waned in popularity over the past ~15 years.
|
| As far as I know, the large-scale freakout happened after the
| American Academy of Pediatrics released a report recommending
| limits for "screen time" specifically for young children, which
| grabbed a _lot_ of headlines. They later walked it back and
| basically changed the recommendation to be against unsupervised
| media consumption, and that grabbed a lot fewer headlines.
| weakfortress wrote:
| This is being so characteristically HN-pedantic it hurts.
| "Screen time" in this context is used disparagingly to refer to
| _useless_ time in front of a computer or phone. No one
| classifies reading the encyclopedia britannica on a computer as
| "screen time".
| beezlebroxxxxxx wrote:
| "Screen time" is just the term that most people use for "use of
| technology", in this case TV, and other computer tech (tablets,
| desktops, phones). What they are really talking about is the
| applications or "services" the kids are addicted to staring at
| and using by way of the screens.
|
| > Screens are not inherently bad, or good, or anything anymore
| than a window is bad or good.
|
| Once you understand it's not really the screens as such, but
| the things the kids are looking at by way of the screens, then
| the value neutral claim kind of falls apart because the things
| the kids are looking at by way of the screens _are_ made to be
| addictive and optimized to an absurd degree for that effect of
| habit formation. Tech companies have been on a decades long
| move to remove the concept of "just a screen", an obvious
| example being TVs which are now all "smart". Seeing as we know
| that habit formation is easier to bring about in children
| (their habits and behaviour as children defined by their
| plastic nature at that age) it's within reason to be worried
| that an industry and parenting practice is essentially enabling
| intense habit formation in children for material gain.
|
| I wouldn't let imprecise language get in the way of the main
| issue: is addiction to certain services and technology
| something we want for our children? The fact that tech execs
| have decided "no" seems to be ironic considering they have no
| problem with _other_ children doing it.
| superkuh wrote:
| There's more to the internet than corporate sites and TV
| streams.
|
| Even if I accept your premise that there are corporations out
| there literally intentionally addicting kids (successfully!)
| in a way that fits the medical definitions of addition, it's
| still just those corporations. The internet, and in general
| technology, are so much more. Screen time limits are throwing
| the baby out with the bathwater. Maybe it'd be better to
| block corporate sites and still let the kids explore all the
| amazing educational and personal growth potential out there.
| xlii wrote:
| I know people who limit heavily usage of the devices (1-2h
| per day at most), but those kids have Instagram, FB etc.,
| even though kids are way too young to use this kind of tech
| (<10 years old, so accounts would be locked out if reported).
|
| On the other side of the spectrum I know 11-year olds who
| spend 6-7h per day on FT calls with their group.
|
| In the end, both behaviours are screen time.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| Do you know any people who _actually_ limit screen time,
| without making a bizarre exception for social media?
| swayvil wrote:
| It isn't no much "use of technology" as "immersed in media"
|
| And by media I mean this shared dreamland that we are
| navigating at the moment.
|
| The dreamland has gotten more powerful over time
| (..text..radio..tv..games..social media..)
|
| It has gone from entertainment and news to an alternate
| reality that we spend part of our life in.
|
| So ya, living in dreamland... you gotta think about that. The
| pros and cons and such.
| darthrupert wrote:
| Seems completely normal. Don't parents do this generally?
| beezlebroxxxxxx wrote:
| It used to be far more common, waned over the last 2 decades,
| but now it's coming back into fashion. Generally, phones and
| tablets are often replacements for baby sitters, or more sadly,
| interacting with a child. The idea of plopping your kid infront
| of a TV or tablet for a couple hours "to calm them down" is
| very common. Some do it because they are tired, other because
| it is simply easy, among other reasons.
| mythhouse wrote:
| yea I've seen this too. suprising how many people are not
| interested in being parents but decide to have kids for
| whatever reason.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Your assumption is that they decided anything.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| Back in the 90s, my brothers and I had our screen time limited
| by egg timers. 30 minutes a day normally, 60 if our grades were
| good, 0 if our grades were poor. This was for games/TV,
| computer time spent on school work or other research was not
| included.
|
| This was not common at the time, _most_ of my friends had
| unlimited screentime, a few of them had to abide by rules
| similar to mine. Also, the computer was a big thing in the
| middle of the living room, not something I could slip into my
| pocket. So auditing for rule compliance was a lot easier. And
| the three of us shared one computer for most of that time, so
| if anybody was cheating the timer and taking more time, the
| odds of being ratted out were pretty good.
|
| In retrospect I think the rules were worthwhile, because they
| kept me active outdoors. And because in college I got to see
| the damage video game addiction can do to some people. It's
| like alcohol in that most people can enjoy it fine but a
| substantial minority ruin their lives with it. Parents would be
| very careless to not place reasonable limits on how much
| alcohol their children drink each day.
| PakG1 wrote:
| Lately, I don't even have time to watch TV or movies anymore, so
| we don't even have a TV. We of course have computers, tablets,
| and smartphones, given the world today. But we never put them in
| front of our toddler for her to watch. The only time we have her
| looking at a smartphone is when we do a video call to
| grandparents.
|
| These days, she's really excited for me to read books to her. She
| grabs her books off the shelves and brings them to me, and when
| we're done, she goes and grabs more. Last night, she kept wanting
| to go back to reading one called _Barnyard Dance_ over and over
| again. She loves it.
|
| After experiencing life with her not caring about screens, I'm
| actually quite excited and intrigued. I love that she's excited
| to read books, demands me to read them to her, and cries when I
| say it's time to stop and go sleep or go eat or whatever. I've
| not yet experienced life with her extensively in front of
| screens, but at this point, I think I enjoy life without screens
| for the toddler in terms of our family relationship, and I think
| I'll keep it going for as long as I can. She seems to be full of
| life without them, why try to fix what's not broken?
|
| Eventually though, I wouldn't mind if she became a software
| engineer, if that's how she's bent, so probably need to introduce
| screens sometime. But we'll put it off for as long as possible
| and when screens do come into her life, hopefully, she'll go at
| them with the same excitement she goes at books and also doesn't
| lose her love for books.
| gdubs wrote:
| Honestly the hardest thing to do as a parent comes down to
| setting a good example. If we want our kids to do more than
| scroll mindlessly for hours and hours, it's incredibly impactful
| for us to model that behavior. (I'm nowhere near as good about
| this as I'd like to be.)
|
| With our first kid we were pretty adamant about screen time
| restriction at a young age. By kid three, the restrictions had
| loosened significantly. There was also a pandemic in there -- but
| in addition to having a lot more on our hands as parents, we
| established things like family games at night etc.
|
| We watched Avatar the Last Airbender as a family and it was a
| great thing to do together. I introduced the kids to Sim City
| Classic and Scratch programming.
|
| It's all about balance but ultimately, as parents we gotta "walk
| the walk" and model the behavior we want to see in our kids.
| thenerdhead wrote:
| One of the best things I've done is locked my phone in my
| office and only model reading around them. Funny enough, they
| pick up their books and try to read (mostly looking at pictures
| cause they're young).
|
| Modeling good habits is really important.
| trosi wrote:
| It's like noticing that McDonald's execs don't take their kids to
| eat fast food every day. Too much screen time can be dangerous
| for anyone.
| the_only_law wrote:
| Would make for about as interesting as article/conversation
| too.
| weakfortress wrote:
| I generally find the most technically competent people I work
| with generally are simpletons when it comes to technology. Once
| you see how the sausage is made the master plan of the
| technocracy becomes obvious.
| GuB-42 wrote:
| I don't have kids but am a bit conflicted with the desire to
| limit their screen time too much (reasonable limits are fine).
|
| Tech is their world, that's how they communicate, how they get
| their information and entertainment. For people who know how life
| was without the internet may feel like it is addiction, that it
| is "untrue", that nothing is better than face to face, that
| constant stimulation is bad, etc... But what if it is our problem
| and not theirs, that we have trouble adapting and are simply
| projecting our trouble to children, when themselves have no
| problem dealing with the situation.
|
| I mean, late GenX to early millenials lived their childhood in
| the world of TV, which is worse than what we have today in many
| ways, and they are fine! I trust children of today, they will
| make something great, and we will get lost, like the old geezers
| we are starting to become.
| freedude wrote:
| "I don't have kids but am a bit conflicted with the desire to
| limit their screen time too much"
|
| What you do in moderation your children will do in excess.
| submeta wrote:
| These Executives are restricting the screen time of their
| children for a number of reasons. Some executives, like Evan
| Spiegel and Sundar Pichai, grew up without much access to
| technology and credit the technology restriction to their
| success. They may want to replicate this experience for their own
| children. Other executives, like Steve Jobs, value face-to-face
| conversation and interaction and believe that technology can be a
| distraction from these types of interactions. Some executives,
| like Susan Wojcicki, want their children to learn how to manage
| technology responsibly and balance screen time with other
| activities. Others, like Alexis Ohanian and Serena Williams, want
| to limit their daughter's screen time as she gets older to ensure
| that she doesn't become overly reliant on or addicted to
| technology.
| saghm wrote:
| > Others, like Alexis Ohanian and Serena Williams, want to
| limit their daughter's screen time as she gets older to ensure
| that she doesn't become overly reliant on or addicted to
| technology
|
| I had an interesting epiphany when reading this sentence. At
| first, my reaction was that this was a bit of a different
| comparison to the others, given that Serena Williams is much
| more famous than her husband, and she's known not for
| technology but for being arguably the most dominant athlete of
| an entire generation (not just in her sport, and not just among
| women, but like, decades of winning tournaments at the highest
| level is basically unparalleled). But then I realized that most
| of these other people mentioned also have another parent
| alongside them, and the fact that they're not famous doesn't
| mean that they don't have equally strong opinions about how to
| raise a child, and ideally most parenting couples will be
| cooperative and not just "the most famous person's opinions
| win". I wonder if a lot of these famous executives didn't come
| up with their parenting strategies on their own, but after
| discussion and inspiration from their partner as well. Put in
| that light, it's a lot harder for me to just assume hypocrisy
| when I know I've grown and changed so much for the better since
| finding my partner to settle down with for the rest of my life.
| We don't have any desire for children of our own, but it seems
| pretty logical that if it were something we wanted, the initial
| ideas I had when we started discussing parenting would
| potentially evolve through insights I would gain from my
| partner, since that's exactly what's happened with all of the
| discussions we've had about long-term plans that we do have.
| weakfortress wrote:
| When I was growing up computers were dumb and hard. To be a kid
| using a computer you not only needed to develop the smarts to be
| able to USE the damn thing, but to make use of it you needed to
| spend a lot of time...reading. As I got older things like iCQ and
| IRC were popular and generally you simply met other like-minded
| people and could generally get by on anonymity. Communities were
| far better, there was no such thing and "doing it for the <social
| media platform>". It was hard to melt your brain on
| albinoblacksheep or newgrounds because content wasn't released on
| a millisecond basis. You could realistically binge on these
| similar to kids today and be stuck waiting weeks to months before
| the next round of brain melting content came out. Don't get me
| wrong I played plenty of video games on the computer. However, I
| had to figure out how to even do that to get started. Moreover,
| we didn't have always-on internet. You called in and put a stupid
| phone on a machine. Then modems came out. Good luck binging on
| _anything_ when your mom needed the phone to gossip with her
| friends. I suppose this is no different than any technical field.
| Once things are made easy enough a caveman can do it, the next
| generation loses the creativity and ingenuity their fore-bearers
| had.
|
| Now, screen time is implied to be negative. As it should be. Your
| average kid's screen time is not sitting at a terminal trying to
| puzzle out how to make a computer work. They are not sitting
| watching 8 hours of programming videos, or math videos, or Carl
| Sagan's cosmos. They aren't listening to audiobooks of war and
| peace. They are, quite literally, melting their brain with the
| videographic equivalent of cocaine. I am of the opinion parents
| these days who allow their kids unrestricted time on
| TikTok/Facebook/Youtube/etc are doing them a major developmental
| disservice. The entire social media machine is powered by
| designed-in-a-laboratory techniques to keep you locked in. If an
| adult, with all their life experience, cannot resist such
| temptations expecting a child to do the same is non-sensical.
| It's gotten far too easy to not only use a computer, but to
| become hopelessly addicted to content farms via the "always-on"
| new world. Kids just aren't being kids anymore.
|
| Times were different back then. Some people may disagree, but the
| "nerd" kids 30 years ago were smarter, faster, and better than
| such kids today. No different than our grandparents having to be
| the same way back when. They had to be. Now, things are easier.
| For better or worse. The same technology that could've raised the
| new generation to be even better than us was instead co-opted by
| advertisers to hopelessly addict children and adults to what
| amounts to just a different form of pornography (which,
| coincidentally was ALSO harder for us to get...I digress). I
| guess this is more of a thesis on the state of the world than
| just computers...it's all related.
| thenerdhead wrote:
| There's that scene in Scarface about "Don't get high on your own
| supply". Those who are selling the products tend to not be the
| consumers of them. Tech, Fast Food, Drugs, etc.
|
| Moderation and information diets are especially helpful for those
| of us who can't afford people to raise our kids for us.
| dang wrote:
| I seem to recall other threads about this but other than the
| following, I can't find them:
|
| _Why Gates and Jobs shielded their kids from tech_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16251875 - Jan 2018 (9
| comments)
|
| Anybody?
|
| Edit: there are these:
|
| _Silicon Valley's supposed obsession with tech-free private
| schools (2019)_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30746379 -
| March 2022 (116 comments)
|
| _A Silicon Valley School That Doesn't Compute (2011)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18340767 - Oct 2018 (22
| comments)
|
| _A Silicon Valley School That Doesn't Compute_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3145080 - Oct 2011 (40
| comments)
| tomhallett wrote:
| For Christmas, I bought my kids a _physical_ set of encylopedias
| [1], usually $600, but black friday sale for $400. My son wanted
| to know "What are the top 30 soccer teams in the world cup all
| time?". Instead of googling it, which would have given him a
| listacle article with random facts and other clickbait, the
| encyclopedia had:
|
| * Winners and runners up for the past 15 world cups * a break
| down of soccer per continent, comparing and contrasting them
|
| He then went and totaled how many wins different countries have
| gotten....
|
| For a family like mine which can afford $400 for a set of books,
| this has been an amazing purchase which is a far superior first
| step to "pull out an ipad and google it".
|
| [1]: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0716601214
| core-utility wrote:
| And for families who can't afford $400, library cards are free.
| [deleted]
| tester457 wrote:
| And for families without access to libraries, torrents are
| free
| bfgoodrich wrote:
| [dead]
| Delfwood wrote:
| > Winners and runners up for the past 15 world cups
|
| The information your son has access to is outdated.
| somekyle2 wrote:
| If the 2021 encyclopedia is outdated, so is almost every fact
| in my head about the broader world.
| mrpf1ster wrote:
| I credit my entire software engineering career to the my
| ability to effectively use a search engine and find resources
| on the internet.
|
| Nowadays Google is filled with ads and fake sites, but maybe a
| subscription to something like Kagi (https://kagi.com/) would
| be worthwhile?
| ctvo wrote:
| I don't think a lot of people dispute that more screen time is
| harmful. Not in itself, but usually because that screen time is
| spent on social media or platforms like YouTube. It harms our
| self image, attention span, spreads conspiracy theories, and who
| knows what else.
|
| Even being somewhat aware of this parents make the tradeoff.
|
| Imagine if cigarettes didn't have an age limit and while smoking
| your kids were calm, quiet, and easier to manage. What tradeoffs
| would parents have made? I'd guess a lot more of us would have
| respiratory issues.
|
| I wouldn't doubt there's a correlation between screen time and
| socio-economics. Having more money gives parents a choice. They
| can provide more enriching activities, hire a nanny, spend time
| directly with their children, n things that are viable
| alternatives to an iPad that a family with less may not have
| access to.
| aga98mtl wrote:
| > I don't think a lot of people dispute that more screen time
| is harmful.
|
| I dispute it. Me and my friends played video games a lot,
| watched a lot of tv, etc. We all turned out fine. I think most
| people did the exact same thing and turned out fine too. Screen
| time = harm is an idea that flies in the face of the common
| reality lived by everyone born since 1980.
|
| This idea sounds a lot like people who thought novels were
| dangerous, that comic books were dangerous, that rock and roll
| was dangerous, etc.
| thenerdhead wrote:
| Do you still do those things a lot? Do you have a hard time
| quitting them?
|
| Turning out fine is not the problem here. It's the addiction
| that is formed creating habits that are extremely difficult
| to give up. This only gets worse each generation due to even
| more time in front of screens. Kids from the 80s spent more
| time outside than those from the 90s and so on.
|
| https://www.childinthecity.org/2018/01/15/children-spend-
| hal...
| thenerdhead wrote:
| Some good points here.
|
| The difference is that smoking is well-known to be net-negative
| to most people and backed by the department of justice. Our
| parents used television and video game consoles. We are too
| early into even seeing the repercussions of this excess
| screentime. There's only been maybe one generation who had
| access to constant screentime (millennials).
|
| From the look of some statistics from books like Jonathan
| Haidt, the CDC, and increasing screentime trends YoY, I would
| say this isn't looking good.
|
| I recently wrote a book on this talking about all these
| challenges from the perspective of someone(30 now) who was
| raised with the over-reliance of a gameboy/TV being my
| babysitter and the only thing I want more in the world is less
| time on screens, but it's a hard battle to fight (akin to being
| a lifelong smoker and trying to quit).
| tootie wrote:
| The evidently for the damage of excessive screen time is
| surprisingly weak. It's a thing everyone expects to be true but
| studies have been very mixed and don't do a good job
| controlling for types of content.
|
| As an anecdote, my kids (11 & 14) have no limits on screen time
| and spend an inordinate amount of time gaming and watching
| YouTube. So do I. We're all happy and healthy and excelling in
| school. Social lives are a bit quiet but that's largely due to
| personality (I was the same pre-internet). Obviously everyone
| is different but for us, it's fine.
|
| One critical thing to understand is that while you can nudge
| your children's behavior one way or the other you absolutely
| can't change their personalities. That's just DNA. I have
| exactly two parenting rules to live by:
|
| * Marry well, that's 50% of their genes
|
| * Have enough money
|
| Eating vegetables, taking swim lessons, quiet time after
| dinner. Those are all well and good but will have a negligible
| impact on their lives long term.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| > _I don 't think a lot of people dispute that more screen time
| is harmful. Not in itself, but usually because that screen time
| is spent on social media or platforms like YouTube._
|
| It's both. A poor information diet is harmful of course, but so
| is screen use in general. Screen use is a sedentary activity
| which damages your body. At least at work we get compensated
| for the damage, like a construction worker who gets compensated
| for wearing out his body with hard labor. The programmer pay is
| better and the damage more manageable, but it's still not
| harmless. Too much time in front of a screen will atrophy your
| muscles and slow your metabolism.
|
| You can offset this damage by getting a gym membership, an
| active hobby, etc. But kids have trouble finding a healthy
| balance (not least because so many screen-activities are
| designed to be addictive) and that's why screen time limits are
| useful.
| chollida1 wrote:
| > In Steve Jobs' household, dinnertime was reserved for face-to-
| face conversation with his children -- meaning no iPads or
| iPhones in sight.
|
| I mean, not having phones at the diner table seems to be the
| norm. I'm sure there are some families who read their phones at
| the diner table but its certainly not the norm around my friend
| group.
|
| > "I have times when I take away all my kids' phones, especially
| if we're on a family vacation, because I want people to interact
| with each other," said Wojcick. "So, I take away their phones and
| say: 'We're all going to focus on being present today.'"
|
| Again, this seems to be by far the norm in my friend group. If
| you are spending a fortune to take your family on vacation, then
| we expect our kids to be present and enjoy the vacation. Play in
| the ocean, or the splash pads or rides at amusement parks.
|
| These don't seem to be all that extreme and just normal
| parenting.
| cortesoft wrote:
| I've preferred to read while I eat for almost 40 years, now.
| When I was a kid, I would even read the cereal box, I just
| needed to read something.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Yes, same. I was a bookworm as a kid, never found sports or
| video games very interesting but I loved to read. I do
| somewhat regret that my parents didn't push me out of my
| comfort zone esp. with sports because that became a big
| social limitation as I got older. But at the same time, I
| remember I really wanted nothing to do with it as a young
| child, so it might not have worked even if they tried.
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| Phones are newfangled. My parents used to tease my dinner-time
| book-reading by making comparisons to Evelyn Waugh's Edward
| Ryder. (thus demonstrating they were not above a nip of the old
| hotmetal themselves?)
| exolymph wrote:
| You're in a particular socioeconomic bubble. Not a bad thing,
| but it does mean that your circle's norm is not necessarily the
| norm amongst the population at large.
|
| An example of how the other half lives (so to speak) is
| provided by people in restaurants who let their kid stay glued
| to a tablet watching YouTube or playing the Angry Birds du
| jour, often at blaring volume without headphones, while
| everybody else eats. Like TV, these tech toys provide easy,
| cheap babysitting.
| aaomidi wrote:
| [flagged]
| jeffwask wrote:
| His daughter Lisa's mother had to take him to court to prove
| paternity before he took responsibility despite her clearly
| being his.
| heywhatupboys wrote:
| all while he lived in luxuery and his daughter and mother
| had to live in poverty scraping by with donations from the
| food shelter
| borski wrote:
| Whether that's true or not is irrelevant to the parent
| comment; a "no phones at the dinner table" rule is
| definitively not "creepy."
| kqr wrote:
| I know of several families (the parents on both my side and my
| wife's side) where reading the newspaper over breakfast is
| normal. Only these days the newspaper is often a digital
| subscription on a tablet or phone.
|
| It's another small step to browse social media (after all,
| that's how a lot of people get their news) in the same way, or
| over different meals than breakfast.
|
| All in all, I share your observations, but I'm also not
| surprised if other people have to make that decision
| consciously.
| anotherman554 wrote:
| Reading the newspaper at breakfast is an old TV trope. If TV
| is any indication it's socially acceptable to read things
| during the first meal of the day but not the latter ones.
| googlryas wrote:
| It's not just a trope, because generally, in the 20th
| century, newspapers were delivered in the mornings. So
| reading while eating breakfast and seeing what is happening
| in the world before you started your day is what many
| people actually did.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| This comment confuses me. The newspaper arrives early in
| the morning, before or around the time most people wake. It
| is traditionally read at the earliest opportunity, which is
| usually breakfast, as it can often inform the reader before
| they go about their day. For example, weather, or local or
| global events of note that may be socially relevant.
|
| None of this is really true for other mediums. You can look
| at your phone wherever. It's not a shared resource for the
| household.
| CBLT wrote:
| Where I grew up, the working class paper was delivered
| later in the day, and was traditionally read at/after
| dinner. On the other hand the prim bourgeoisie newspaper
| was delivered early in the morning and was traditionally
| read at breakfast. I thought that's how the blue collar /
| white collar divide was everywhere.
| mythhouse wrote:
| > I take away their phones and say: 'We're all going to focus
| on being present today.
|
| Thats all it takes?
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| That and some follow through. Kids learn their parents' weak
| spots quickly.
| lnsru wrote:
| Rich people do not need cheap entertainment. Why to buy a kid
| debilitating app when you can get best piano or best horse riding
| teacher in town. The world of the riches is a bit different. I am
| not talking about middle management rich. I am talking about the
| richt people like in this article.
| [deleted]
| pcurve wrote:
| I agree. I feel a bit uncomfortable with the premise of this
| article. It's quasi deifying the tech execs.
|
| "CEO Evan Spiegel grew up without TV, and credits the
| technology restriction to his success".
|
| Sigh. Only if things were that simple. I'm sure it was one of
| hundreds of factors that worked in his favors.
| kqr wrote:
| Or he was successful despite the restriction! There's really
| no way to know just from one sample.
| memonkey wrote:
| Pretty sure a lot of it has to do with this:
|
| > Spiegel was born in Los Angeles, California, to lawyers
| John W. Spiegel and Melissa Ann Thomas. He grew up in
| Pacific Palisades, California, where he was raised
| Episcopalian. He was educated at the Crossroads School for
| Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica, and attended Stanford
| University.[1]
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evan_Spiegel
| spacemadness wrote:
| It's basically a financial tabloid. They all do this--pump
| out worship of the rich and successful that gets eaten up by
| the masses of temporarily embarrassed millionaires that read
| it and try to emulate what they do.
| dsfyu404ed wrote:
| > masses of temporarily embarrassed millionaires
|
| The "managerial class" people who actually read this stuff
| are often literally millionaires if you count their
| inflated home values and retirement funds. This is a
| magazine to be read by doctors, lawyer, investment bankers
| and techies, not people who work outdoors.
|
| The sliced of the economic ladder who are often derided by
| people slightly up the ladder as "temporarily embarrassed
| millionaires" for not sharing the same views mostly don't
| care what the billionaires are up to unless one of them
| tries to buy an election presides over some technological
| breakthrough or some other highly newsworthy event.
| dehrmann wrote:
| Playing the piano is a different sort of entertainment. The
| drive to practice has to come from within.
| [deleted]
| foxandmouse wrote:
| This is like saying rich people are more cultured cause they
| travel more...
| bfgoodrich wrote:
| [dead]
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Screen _time_ is only part of it. As a Digital Vegan I 'm nore
| focused on screen _quality_.
|
| The newest command line user in our family is 7. I gave her a
| Raspberry Pi last Christmas and loaded one thing; a python shell
| "PlayOS" that I wrote to make everything a three or four letter
| command. The idea is to improve her reading and writing/typing by
| putting everything she wants a few keystrokes away on the command
| line.
|
| So far we have: music - plays a random tune from
| her music collection music abba - selects something
| more specific see - shows something visual, for
| example; see me - random photos from the holiday album
| see octonauts - an undersea cartoon plays read -
| stories and rhymes say - make the computer speak
| (festival - which she calls robot voice)
|
| Basically, each time she expresses an interest I add a python
| tuple which is a parsing template like alias + exec. After that
| she memorises the command. By 9 I expect her to have mastered a
| computer by typing, including sending emails to mom and dad etc.
| When she's had enough she knows the poweroff command - which it's
| own kind of fun.
|
| Most of her friends drag their fingers over images on tablets.
| They get into a tantrum if it's taken away from them. They are
| addicts before they are 10.
|
| Hopefully I'm helping build a life-long skill, but I dread the
| day her friends, pawing at screen like retarded monkeys, tell her
| that phones are better :)
|
| Yes, there are physiological reasons to limit screen time too.
| But that's not my threat model at present. Time to boredom on
| PlayOS is always less than 1 hour.
| MagicMoonlight wrote:
| That's great. You could try her out on BASIC too, she can write
| out games from the old magazines and then play them and modify
| the code. That'll really get her going without providing her
| with access to the internet etc
| maximinus_thrax wrote:
| Yikes. With all due respect, in my view, the self-righteousness
| of this comment dismisses the point it's trying to make. The
| 'retarded monkeys' comment really sells it...
|
| > Most of her friends drag their fingers over images on tablets
|
| I guess there's value in thinking your kids are better than
| other kids. I wonder if you have the same level of transparency
| involving animal kingdom references with your friends about how
| their kids use their devices.
|
| But anyway, I don't believe the UX is the problem here. The
| idea is to 'limit' screen time and subsequently information
| consumption at the ready. Not sure how a command line interface
| is a solution better than say parental controls with app time
| limits, over an already existent UX that everyone is familiar
| with.
|
| PS: Your book was on my reading list. Was.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| > PS: Your book was on my reading list. Was.
|
| You absolutely dodged a bullet there. If you don't like
| strongly opinionated writing save your time and money. Now,
| where else could you get such up-front _pre-views_ than HN.
| Gotta love this place eh?
| fipar wrote:
| That's an interesting approach though I'd avoid comparing her
| friends to retarded monkeys. I can tell you from experience she
| might actually enjoy hanging around some of the 'retarded
| monkeys' and the knowledge that mum or dad feels that way about
| them is an unnecessary source of tension.
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| I really like the idea ( and it is likely not a bad way to
| introduce the kid to command line eventually ). Consider adding
| it on github ( or similar ). I am relatively certain you will
| get an audience for it.
| tsunamifury wrote:
| I applaud your purposeful-ness with your daughter but:
|
| I would strongly recommend that calling her friends "retarded
| monkeys" is a mentality that will do far far more damage in the
| long run than any screen time.
|
| Being right and being self righteous are too very different
| things. Be purposeful there too. I say this as someone who
| struggles with passing on the same problematic mentalities to
| my children.
|
| Edit: parent removed the statement.
| themitigating wrote:
| What's odd and maybe telling of this person's mentality is
| that calling them monkeys would have been sufficient since he
| said "pawing at".
| inthepipe wrote:
| Monkeys don't even have paws.
| Oxidation wrote:
| They definitely can be called that, even if not
| technically correct:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkey%27s_Paw
|
| Urgh, now I'm one of those "actually, language is how
| people use it" types. Literally.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| Paw is sometimes an informal/humorous word for 'hand'.
| hgsgm wrote:
| [dead]
| googlryas wrote:
| They said "pawed at", which is a phrase for an inelegant
| bumbling interaction with something. It is not literal.
| And they also said "like retarded monkeys", not that they
| _are_ retarded monkeys.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Content was never removed. I stand by it. Of course I never
| _call_ her friends that, which would be destructive,
| inappropriate and alienating for the all the reasons you
| wisely relay.
|
| I stand by it because I'm talking about their behaviour, not
| what they _are_. They 're bright kids ( or they wouldn't be
| her mates ). But what I often see them _do_ , which looks a
| lot like randomly bashing at a screen to "make shit happen",
| isn't the pinnacle of technology I want my kids to
| experience. Not until 15, wasted with her mates and playing
| the 2032 version of DOOM or whatever.
|
| Interestingly, if there's any friction or danger it comes
| from not biting my lip in criticising other parenting styles.
| That's actually where the weird stuff is, in the relations
| between the grown-ups. Most parents are naturally touchy
| about even implied criticism. And many do feel guilt about
| using phones and tablets as pacifiers.
|
| As I say in the book, I learned that a long time ago and am a
| practising but not preaching digital vegan.
| burkaman wrote:
| Yes and she's 7, so 1) her friends have probably already told
| her that phones are better, and 2) she's probably aware of
| her dad's attitude and therefore isn't fully open with him
| about what she's interested in and what she does at friends'
| houses.
|
| And FYI the statement has not been removed, or it's been
| added back in.
| sweetjuly wrote:
| Totally agreed. My parents were always weirdly mean about my
| friends and often, their appearances. All it ever achieved
| was discouraging me from telling them anything at all about
| my friends and never bringing them around the house because I
| didn't trust them to be kind to the people I cared about.
| zht wrote:
| I feel bad for your daughter being raised with someone who
| thinks they are so much better than other people.
|
| You may not be calling them retarded monkeys in front of your
| daughter but I'm sure your sense of superiority comes through.
|
| I hope your daughter doesn't pick it up
| 88stacks wrote:
| amazing, can you write a full blog post about this.I want to do
| something similar.
| [deleted]
| patrickdavey wrote:
| Love this idea. Could you just expand a little on PlayOS? It's
| this running an underlying OS which then boots into a bash
| console running your repl?
|
| Just curious, would love to do something similar (or use yours
| if it was available!)
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Sure.
|
| My first response to "let's do computers daddy" was to
| install a kids KDE Linux with some things like TuXPaint and
| whatever. But I noticed she really wanted to be doing what I
| was doing - typing. Also I had to launch everything. And it
| seemed inevitable that within minutes alone with the machine
| she'd accidentally get into desktop configuration and hide
| the task bar or something.
|
| So then I thought, what about just Bash?
|
| That didn't work so well either, and I ended up aliasing so
| many commands to simpler things - but it was a step in the
| right direction.
|
| So now I just launch into a "kiosk mode shell" made in python
| that dispatches the commands we talk about together. We
| say... wouldn't it be cool if a computer could do this or
| that, and then I think about how to make that a single three
| letter command with a few options. I'd love it if she'd get
| into bash or programming properly as another commenter's kid
| did, but I won't push it, this is foundation work. There's
| every possibility she'll say "I'm bored with computers dad"
| and I'll just have to try not to be broken-hearted :) Perhaps
| the main aim is to cultivate a respect and healthy attitude
| for real computers, so tablets and phones seem like the toys
| they are.
| floren wrote:
| I think this is great! I'm curious, though; how much time does
| she spend on `see octonauts`? I've seen the way kids get
| absolutely glued to the current crop of CGI kid shows (ye gods
| the pacing is frenetic) and I guess I'd expect most kids to
| just mash the button like a rat in a Skinner box, so I'm
| pleasantly surprised to hear you say she spends less than an
| hour at a time.
| invalidOrTaken wrote:
| people are dogging on you and clutching pearls, but this is
| really cool and cute. I _strongly_ agree that _quality_ of
| screen time is an important, oft-neglected consideration.
| burkaman wrote:
| The more I reread this the less it makes sense.
|
| > each time she expresses an interest I add a python tuple
|
| Did you get into computers by intentionally expressing an
| interest and then having tidbits fed to you by someone? Or did
| you discover it organically through full access to libraries
| and the internet and video games and magazines? When she
| expresses an interest in something you aren't familiar with,
| will you let her explore it herself or will everything be
| filtered through you?
|
| > By 9 I expect her to have mastered a computer by typing,
| including sending emails to mom and dad etc.
|
| You think she'll be better at typing than kids that are
| constantly texting and Googling Roblox mods and arguing in
| YouTube comments?
|
| > retarded monkeys
|
| This has been addressed enough in other comments. But just to
| give you an example, I was raised without cable TV because my
| parents didn't have it. But they didn't call my friends
| retarded, and they didn't care if I watched some with friends
| or relatives. As a result, I still didn't watch much TV, but I
| didn't feel guilty when I did and I didn't feel like I had to
| hide anything from my parents.
|
| I turned out great, and my friends who had a TV in their own
| bedroom with 1000 channels also turned out great. Access or
| lack of access to TV has had no discernible impact on anyone I
| know.
| safety1st wrote:
| The 'retarded monkeys' characterization was coarse, but I do
| think there's something special (and especially dangerous)
| about mobile devices.
|
| 1) They're always with you
|
| 2) Input capabilities are limited so they tend to encourage
| consumption over creation
|
| 3) They run robust software stacks which enable addictive
| experiences
|
| A general computer sitting on a desk isn't going to be used
| as often, and when it does get used, it'll be easier to write
| on. Writing's good for the brain.
|
| A television has _really_ limited input capabilities, it 's
| not healthy to watch TV and the "TV rots your brain" concern
| predates the Internet. But it isn't as addictive as a mobile
| device.
|
| A phone or tablet is the worst of both worlds. I've put a
| fair bit of effort into reducing my time with those devices
| in recent years, and I think I'm happier and more productive
| as a result. If I had a kid I think I would do the same with
| them.
| hgsgm wrote:
| [dead]
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| This is worth replying to because you ask important
| questions;
|
| > Did you get into computers by intentionally expressing an
| interest and then having tidbits fed to you by someone? Or
| did you discover it organically
|
| As a kid in the 70s I discovered it as "monkey see monkey
| do". Other adults (airforce buddies of my dad) were doing
| clever shit with them, which obviously impressed and engaged
| my dad, so I was drawn in.
|
| > interest in something you aren't familiar with, will you
| let her explore it herself or will everything be filtered
| through you?
|
| I am a student of Paulo Friere [1] and fan of John Taylor
| Gatto [2] so I'd find over-controlling pedagogy quite
| abhorrent. The trick of "Liberation pedagogy" is to open
| doors to the earliest self-sufficient (auto-didactic)
| exploration. Unfortunately the unfiltered internet is not a
| fit place for a 7 year old. At some point I intend to curate
| a "mini-net", probably a downloaded Wikipedia on localhost.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paulo_Freire
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Taylor_Gatto
| opyate wrote:
| > Unfortunately the unfiltered internet is not a fit place
| for a 7 year old.
|
| I wholeheartedly agree. 6 and 9-y-old here. Apps and
| websites are approve-only, and no YouTube/YTkids.
|
| Something bad happened a few years ago which gave us a big
| scare.
| thethethethe wrote:
| "retarded monkeys"
|
| Yikes
| bendbro wrote:
| YIKES, indeed. I do NOT want to read deplorable filth like
| this on Hacker News in 2023. I think behavior like this
| pleads for a teaching moment. Perhaps a 2 week ban and a
| violence prevention course? This kind of hate speech is what
| keeps me up at night. That, and violence against women.
| thethethethe wrote:
| > Perhaps a 2 week ban and a violence prevention course
|
| Too tame, let's call their boss and get them fired.
|
| /s obviously
| LarryMullins wrote:
| Nice satire.
| bendbro wrote:
| I didn't include a /s.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| I wouldn't have complimented your satire had you spoonfed
| it.
| layer8 wrote:
| Wouldn't have upvoted you otherwise.
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| I had a friend raised like this in a millennial context. Strict
| diet of restricted TV and computers, 1 hour a day for each.
| Cable TV was banned, network television only. Books were all
| him and his sibling were allowed to interact with. He was
| homeschooled for a bit.
|
| In high school he discovered World of Warcraft, through chance.
| He started playing at school. Then sneaking over to friends
| houses to play. Then did everything in his power at home to
| play WoW. He became hopelessly addicted. For 2 years all he
| could do was play WoW. It had a huge effect on his grades and
| his friends. While I don't know all that happened, I think he
| was just unprepared to deal with modern digital consumption
| appetites that the rest of us grew up with.
| vitro wrote:
| On my recent workshop regarding kids' psychology, there was
| said that social media and online world in general is the
| only drug that you have to learn kids to get used to
| gradually.
|
| There's no point in restricting them screen time completely,
| because phones and computers are just everywhere, you cannot
| shield kids forever and sooner or later they will find a way
| how to get connected, so better they are prepared and know
| what's going on and what to be aware of.
| maximinus_thrax wrote:
| On a tangent, I knew a girl in high school who had their love
| life completely owned by their parents since she became a
| teenager. Her mother was a chaperone on her dates, her dad
| was closely monitoring her phone for 'sexting', no bedroom
| door, etc.. It's safe to assume she didn't have much success
| with boys. Come college time, she broke up a marriage, did
| some porn, is now a single mother who moved back with her
| parents. Not saying her parents are to blame, but I can say
| she grew up with a very unhealthy view of romantic
| relationships.
| vwoolf wrote:
| It's also possible that the woman you know is, for
| predominantly genetic or personality reasons, highly sexed
| and sociosexually unrestricted, and her parents' efforts at
| best delayed some matters. There's a line of thinking,
| articulated in Bryan Caplan's _Selfish Reasons to Have More
| Kids_ and elsewhere, that a large component of personality
| is innate and parents spend way too much time trying to
| micro-shape their kids.
|
| There is an interesting writer and tweeter named Aella:
| https://knowingless.com/ who has described at length how
| she was born into a fundamentalist Christian family, found
| herself doing work she hated in a factory at 19, and
| escaped it via nude camming and then sex work (both of
| which she likes a lot, relative to alternatives). She's
| tweeted about how her mom appears to LOVE the trad
| Christian life, and how Aella and some of her siblings hate
| it. Who is "right?" Maybe no one: people's personal
| propensities and desires vary in many ways that appear to
| be genetic in origin, even if their expressions may change
| across cultures, and this may also include in matters of
| sex.
|
| There are lots of pseudo-Freudian theories about how the
| way one is raised affects one's adolescent and adult sex
| life but I'm not sure any of those theories are true.
| folkhack wrote:
| Another anecdote... People think my dad was _nuts_ for
| letting me drink a beer here or there growing up.
|
| It was always in moderation. Typically only one drink,
| _maybe_ two spread out over lots of time if we were
| fishing. He talked openly about keeping drinking in check.
| He even addressed alcoholism in our family history,
| admitting to keeping a close eye on his consumption due to
| those predispositions; stressing that I 'd have to watch it
| too. Since I was a young kid who felt privileged sippin' on
| a Highlife I listened closely taking a lot away from those
| conversations.
|
| Fast forward to HS/college... never drank in HS because it
| was primarily only losers who would drink at the time...
| and in college I was _always_ the party nurse or DD because
| I wouldn 't drink to get drunk - I just didn't see the
| point. Dad had took all of the novelty out of it for me.
|
| ---
|
| Kids who come from overly strict or controlling parents
| often have behavior and moderation issues once leaving the
| nest. Your #1 goal as a parent is to engage them and teach
| them how to navigate life in careful and healthy ways vs.
| trying to outright control their behavior. Hard truth is
| you're not always going to be there - my dad died when I
| was 14. Being an authoritarian doesn't give your kid a
| healthy mental framework to help them through life's
| complexities, you're only teaching them to be afraid of
| punishment and consequences.
| waboremo wrote:
| Some great notes here! Moderating is hard, but it's
| crucial in development. Too much or too little of
| anything has absurd longterm impacts.
|
| Moderation mixed with education has tremendous positive
| impacts. Going with the alcohol example, you grow up
| knowing what it tastes like and what it does, rather than
| growing up completely unaware of it other than your
| college friends say it's cool to get hammered.
|
| You have to be teaching your kids about life, it seems
| like so many forget this trying to create the ultimate
| curated experience for them.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| 14. Shit that made me cry. I hope you always manage to
| steer clear of alcoholism if your old man thought you
| might inherit a disposition. And your dad sounds very
| courageous and wise to talk straight to you.
| justsomehnguy wrote:
| "The forbidden fruit tastes the sweetest."
|
| Sadly this approach doesn't always work, but this is the
| only way to at least to give an idea on how it tastes and
| feels. Works great for spirits for up to 12-14 years,
| though, kids don't like the bitterness at all.
| ksec wrote:
| Kinda surprise her parents still let her in. So I guess
| they are not that bad after all.
| Sakos wrote:
| I'm not sure any of us have figured it out. I grew up with
| the internet and video games. I was hopelessly addicted to
| Counterstrike for 15 years. I don't think kids should have
| complete (unsupervised) control over their own entertainment,
| but it's clear that strict limits aren't sufficient.
|
| I think people have been looking at it from the wrong
| perspective and you hit the nail on the head. He was
| unprepared, yes, but... How exactly are we preparing our kids
| for the internet and video games? This is something we aren't
| talking or thinking about. Putting limits isn't enough. It's
| like forcing abstinence on kids without trying to teach them
| safe sex or about healthy relationships or character values.
|
| I think there should be _some_ limits, but there also needs
| to be an effort to cultivate interests /skills/experiences
| outside of gaming as well as a stronger focus on personal
| values/responsibility and philosophy in general.
| __turbobrew__ wrote:
| I would recommend reading "Indistractible" by Nir Eyql if
| you are looking for more tools for this
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| +1 for this. "Nir Eyal" btw. From excerpts, it's a very
| good guide with plenty of common sense psychology and
| practical advice.
| Sakos wrote:
| Read a few pages and this looks useful, thanks.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| I knew about a dozen college kids in the millennial context
| who grew up with no restrictions on video game use, and it
| was fine for them because their parents handled every aspect
| of their life. Fine for them until college, when they were
| now responsible for themselves and couldn't tear themselves
| away from the screen because video games were all they knew.
| They lost their scholarships and flunked out.
|
| As for myself, I felt shameful if I spent more than an hour
| playing a game because long video game binges is something I
| never became accustomed to in the first place. The habits
| kids learn as kids will follow them at least into young
| adulthood.
| Manuel_D wrote:
| Video game use was also a privilege that my parents used to
| teach responsibility and priorities. If I wanted to be
| allowed to play games, I had to get all As in school,
| complete all chores, and participate in athletics. They
| didn't police my gaming time, so I learned to regulate it
| myself to meet those conditions.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| I think what you describe is closer to my own experience
| than to unregulated screentime. You say they didn't
| police your screen time, but it sounds like they _did_
| forbid you from playing games if you weren 't keeping up
| with your other obligations. In my case, my permitted
| screen time was moderately increased if I got good grades
| and severely decreased if I got bad grades. I think a
| scheme like this, or the one you describe, is a good way
| to do it.
|
| No regulation of screen time at all, no conditions about
| behavior/grades, is dangerous territory. It teaches
| harmful habits which some kids will have a very hard time
| shaking. Have a bad time in school? Come home and numb
| the pain by spending 12 hours playing games late into the
| night. Go to school the next day without enough sleep,
| the cycle repeats but the whole thing doesn't collapse
| because you're still forced to go to school. That is,
| until you hit college and now have the option of skipping
| class to continue playing video games. Then they flunk
| out after a year or two of wasted tuition money. Many of
| the friends I made in freshman year at college flunked
| out due to this vicious cycle of video game binging. All
| of them were long-time gamers by that point, expressing
| great incredulity when I told them I came from a
| household were I was limited to an hour a day. They said
| I had been abused, while they were flunking out due to
| their own lack of self control.
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| Or they could make school more fun and also start later.
|
| But nooo, force the kids to suffer and then act surprised
| when they rebel.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| Oh for sure, making school start later in the day would
| be a huge benefit to teenagers particularly. But this is
| the way it was in college, most of us scheduled most of
| our classes for the afternoon and the gaming addicts
| still skipped class anyway. Both are problems, but I
| don't think addressing one will address the other.
|
| As for school being fun.. if you're doing well and the
| course material is interesting, then school is generally
| fun I think. School becomes particularly unfun when
| you're struggling with difficult/uninteresting material
| combined with the stress that comes from knowing that
| good performance is important to your future. That
| struggle+stress can be very hard on some people and lead
| them to self-medicate by binging alcohol or video games.
| Booze and game binging make people feel better in the
| immediate sense but harms them in the long run. I don't
| think you can address this problem by making school more
| fun, except insofar as you can shift students into
| subjects they care about and can do well in. But stress
| avoidance has its limits, even if school is an absolute
| pleasure, everybody will encounter stress eventually in
| life and knowing alternatives to escapism is important.
| cycomanic wrote:
| I am a little like that. When growing up we had very little
| allowed TV time (admittedly this was common in the 80s, due
| to limited selection) and I get distracted by TVs very
| easily. Compared to friends who grew up with TVs running
| constantly in the house and who have no problem having a
| conversation with a TV in the background, I can't help to
| watch the TV. I therefore hate most modern pubs, which have
| TVs running everywhere and try to always sit so not to have a
| TV in my fov (which is often difficult).
| all2 wrote:
| You've described me.
|
| I've gotten better at eye-fixation control, and also
| careful selection of seats. If I can get a seat facing away
| from the TV I do much better, and I even catch those around
| me gazing at the TVs from time to time.
|
| It is exhausting trying to exert that amount of self
| control, though. The quick bright movements naturally catch
| my eye and I often can't help myself. I'd like to chalk
| this up to innate hunter instincts, but... ;)
| spritefs wrote:
| > Then did everything in his power at home to play WoW. He
| became hopelessly addicted.
|
| I was like this and spent a shit load of that time on a
| computer. Everyone around me said it was a waste of time
| until I realized I wanted to work in software. Then I
| realized they were all full of shit and it was actually a
| very profitable use of time
| c22 wrote:
| I gave my 5 year old a pc running linux when she learned to
| read. She became interested in the command line when she saw me
| using it to help her find a file she had misplaced. I gave her
| a list of simple commands and let her explore. By the time she
| was 7 she had full mastery of the command line and was writing
| her own bash scripts to provide herself with functionality
| similar to your "PlayOS".
|
| The other one never got into it, he prefers to use the gui with
| the touch screen and mostly consumes minecraft or youtube
| videos about minecraft. If he needs tech support he asks his
| sister. I'm fine with all of it. He builds some amazing things
| in minecraft.
| all2 wrote:
| I love that your kids are on the "opposite" ends of the tech
| stack. One is achieving mastery of relatively low level
| software and file manipulation and the other is achieving
| mastery of high level visual programming.
| blub wrote:
| I find it strange how you're so proud that you're teaching them
| a very niche - and outside system administration and
| programming obsolete - way of interacting with computers. There
| are excellent GUIs to learn that will make them more productive
| with computers and also make them feel like they have some
| skills that may actually impress other kids instead of making
| them look weird.
|
| These kinds of projects read to me like using the kid as an
| excuse to build something that the parent thinks is cool. And
| then it starts to make sense, because you obviously think that
| the command line is cool and look down on the kids which use
| touch screens. The bad news for you is that the child's social
| circle decides what's cool, not the parent.
| tester457 wrote:
| Is cool what really matters?
|
| His child being confident in the terminal is a good skill to
| have, her typing skills will transfer over to her writing for
| the many essays of highschool, so she'll be productive faster
| than other kids.
|
| > you're teaching them a very niche - and outside system
| administration and programming obsolete - way of interacting
| with computers.
|
| Most people are scared of the command line, but she has an
| edge knowing it.
|
| It will open the door to countless productivity benefits in
| the future, she could automate a lot of her future work in
| her own creative way that modern guis don't allow.
|
| Small cli scripts go a long way in practically any job. Sadly
| most people still waste hours on spreadsheets and the like
| when they could spend minutes in many cases.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| > These kinds of projects read to me like using the kid as an
| excuse to build something that the parent thinks is cool.
|
| It is, and that's actually very healthy and okay. It's called
| co-construction. I'd urge you to read educational theorists
| like Friere - building motivation through shared interests
| etc.
|
| You're possibly mistaking what I'm doing from _actually_
| trying to teach bash and python etc. That would be insane.
| Those, and the whole vocation of coding, may well be dead by
| the time she 's a teenager. It's about engaged parenting.
| googlryas wrote:
| Parents teach their own niche skills to their children all
| the time. Which is why for most of history, children entered
| the field their parents worked in. Cobblers begat cobblers,
| potters begat potters, etc.
| mr_sturd wrote:
| That sounds like good fun! My four-year-old daughter likes to
| play on an old net book that we have.
|
| She pretends she's working like she's seen Mam and Dad do
| around the house due to the pandemic.
|
| I've only shown her the text editor where she'll type her name
| and other words. Stealthily teaching spelling and typing
| through play.
|
| Would say it's usually about 20 minutes to boredom at the
| moment!
| weakfortress wrote:
| > but I dread the day her friends, pawing at screen like
| retarded monkeys, tell her that phones are better :)
|
| Most humble HN poster. The unearned hubris is astounding. Pray
| tell, do you like Rust? Haskell?
| geek_at wrote:
| When word of my XP based grading system got out I had lots of
| interviews with different TV stations. Most notable RTL which is
| a German kinda trashy TV station and I had a chat with the
| producer assigned with my story.
|
| To my amazement he disallowed hits children the TV entirely
| because he states it was only trash and no good for a developing
| mind.
|
| I had to try hard not to laugh when his station was a heavy part
| of the problem in the German speaking world
| cheschire wrote:
| _All_ of their stations, it 's hard to express just how broad
| of an negative impact the RTL media group has on the quality of
| modern entertainment in Germany.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-12-30 23:01 UTC)