5 ms·

> The anti-Microsoft zeitgeist that you could find at the top of pretty much any thread, even if it was about something completely unrelated. Just a side comme

by Nition 9y ago

> The anti-Microsoft zeitgeist that you could find at the top of pretty much any thread, even if it was about something completely unrelated. Just a side comment, I feel like Hacker News is going this way with Facebook a little. Posts that tangentially mention Facebook, there's usually a high-rated comment about how Facebook is evil and since the user left Facebook their life has improved. Those "I don't even own a TV"-like posts are a bit grating as the top comment on every thread, but hey maybe like you say, it's really pushing towards a better future in the end.

bdamm 9y ago
Not owning a TV is pushing my kid to watch a lot of YouTube. I'm seriously considering buying a TV, after living for 30 years without one, just so that I can have a quality entertainment feed that doesn't bend to the new media's idea of what my kid should watch, because what that ends up being is endless advertisements ("open this egg! What's inside? A Ken doll!! Wow!!") and videos of pandas killing each other with chainsaws, then reaching into the body cavity to find their surprise egg. What a world.
- jerf 9y ago
  Depending on the age of your kids, I suggest total YouTube curation. I've only got up to a nine-year-old but I'm thinking it's going to have to go up to at least 13 or 14 before I can have a serious discussion about just what is out there and how people are trying to manipulate them. Five years ago that would have been more to avoid them from stumbling across the various types of adult content that for various reasons I would have preferred them not to view, and perhaps the HN zeitgeist would have called me a puritan (although I'm not just thinking sex and violence here, but also things like conspiracy theories and politics they are currently incapable of processing and other things [1]). Now, unfortunately, it's more about avoiding the brain hackers that you describe that know how to hack their brains into getting low-level addicted to that sort of garbage, and now perhaps the HN zeitgeist will be less offended at my policy that a poor defenseless six-year-old or nine-year-old in my case can't be expected to defend themselves against this level of sophistication. (Because however stupid those videos may strike you as an adult, they are sophisticated, in their own way. The "cartoons that were just toy commercials" of my youth were nothing compared to what modern kids are being targeted by.) The good news is that we're actually finding some channels where we have some common ground. For instance, they're really digging Homestar Runner now, and I've got some others that I can pick and choose from that we all like. I increasingly pity the "digital natives" that didn't get to ease themselves into this world like I did. I'm not saying they're hopelessly lost; today's article about kids rebelling against social media is heartening. I'm just saying, I had a much easier on-ramp than they did. My first few years worth of youthful indiscretions are now utterly obliterated, because the dial-in BBS they were on is now long gone. I wasn't fucking up on Facebook or where the Internet Archive could find me. By the time I got on to the real internet, oh, I'm sure I could find things that would make me cringe now, but I'm pretty confident I wasn't blowing my foot off anymore. [1]: Oh, and I'm pleased to say that they both seem to be on track to be voracious book readers, which I think is the strongest Step One to being able to deal with the onslaught they will eventually face. My strategy here is not just mere "denial of access", as I am well aware that doesn't work into their adulthood, and my goal is to raise good adults, not good children. I'm still feeling through what my strategy is, on what is shifting sand anyhow, but there's more to it than just "shield them forever."
  - Nition 9y ago
    How are you managing "total curation"? Are you always there with them when they're on YouTube, or are you whitelisting specific channels in some way?
    - zo1 9y ago
      Not the OP, but there is no way that I'm aware of to whitelist (or blacklist!) specific channels on youtube. And thanks to HTTPS, I can't even intercept + modify youtube pages at the network level. Thank you, privacy folks, hope you're happy! Alternatively, there is always kids.youtube.com which is weirdly just an app for Ios/Android. I haven't tried it, and myself have actively disabled/removed all Youtube from being accessible by the younglings. Curated media, decided by me is all they get to watch then.
      - Nition 9y ago
        The YouTube Kids app has a really nice interface, but there's no whitelist option unfortunately. I wish there was. It does let you block videos or channels individually, but you can imagine how much good that does on a site as big as YouTube. As you say, it's also iOS/Android only. No PC option for kids at all.
      - j_s 9y ago
        Does YouTube app/whatever not honor device-trusted root certs? I know Google pins some stuff, and some YouTube players are embedded in appliances. If it were possible to mitm HTTPS specifically for YouTube that would still be a lot of work, maybe a good Raspberry Pi project.
      - ballenf 9y ago
        I'd look into youtube-dl. I tried all the parental controls on Youtube, Netflix, Amazon and devices only to finally realize that my idea of what's suitable doesn't have an equivalent rating. There are so many safe for any age videos that have a bunch of kids with the worst, most cynical attitudes and no respect for authority and then wholesome shows with "intense emotion" or whatever that get rated tv-14. So I download everything and put it on a USB hard drive hooked to a media hub.
- Nition 9y ago
  I really just meant the "I left Facebook" posts have the same kind of feel as the old "I don't even own a TV" cliché, but yeah, I know what you mean as well, and it's a problem. I wish the YouTube Kids app let you optionally whitelist a set of channels instead of only allowing a blacklist. It's nice that you can block a video or a channel, but there are thousands of low-quality channels.
- j_s 9y ago
  I've limited it to Netflix on the big screen. I don't want the constant jumping from video to video either, pick one and then be stuck with it 'til it's done (or turn it off). I am considering Amazon FreeTime Unlimited as well, I would recommend trying that before a TV though I would appreciate any anecdata on it. Also, a shout out to https://dnslearning.org/ https://dnslearning.org/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14913547 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14913547 (Aug 2017) <- expanding that whole YouTube discussion might be worth your time. > utefan001: This is how my 11 year old daughter uses YouTube now... After 30 min, DNS no longer works for entertainment sites. (Pricing was 1 free, $10/month but I don't see any info now... boo!)
  - utefan001 9y ago
    DnsLearning.org now says it is free until January 2018.
- jrmg 9y ago
  I totally know what you mean. I’m worried that my kid is not getting a ‘big’ view of the world, and is instead seeing it via YouTube, and anti-Trump playground conversations (which I agree with, to be sure, but it’s not a very deep or diverse understanding of the world). When I think back to my childhood, my view of what the world, and human society (civic society?) ‘is’ came from TV news my parents happened to be watching - and occasional glances at their newspapers. Even though I try to consume news from wide ranging sources, my kid sees none of that; it’s all an individual pursuit. I fear there’s also a lack of ‘coherence’ in society today, and suspect that everyone watching the same news programme was something that provided it. When we think of current events, I don’t think that we’re all even aware of things outside our ‘bubbles’ - adults are sort of aware of this. What must growing up like this be like though? I’m considering starting to watch evening network news. One problem with that is that we don’t have a TV - just iPads, laptops, and a projector for watching movies. I’ve also subscribed to a delivery of the newspaper on Sunday (though it’s been a month and it’s never actually been successfully delivered to my home yet...) Who’d’ve thought we’d be lamenting the decline of TV the same way our parents lamented the decline of newspapers?!
  - smallnamespace 9y ago
    Yep. My FB feed seems to be 50% pictures of food and travel and 50% anti-Trump articles. Even if you agree with the general sentiment, imagine a child growing up whose main media sources are the informational equivalent of a cross between crack cocaine and junk food.
- mrmyers 9y ago
  I occasionally hear people complaining about ads on youtube, but I have never seen a youtube ad aside from when random people try to show me a video on their computer. Do people just not use adblock+ any more?
  - unixhero 9y ago
    Sure, but not on my phone and on my Samsung 65" smart tv.
    - mrmyers 9y ago
      Ah. Yea, I use firefox for android for mostly that reason.
  - bdamm 9y ago
    You can't avoid the ads if they are presented as videos. It's actually a cultural phenomenon of people making a living by buying toys and making you tube videos about them. You tube then pipes children's eyeballs to these videos.
geezerjay 9y ago
> Just a side comment, I feel like Hacker News is going this way with Facebook a little. In slashdot, PR companies working for Microsoft were operating dozens of sock puppet accounts to post copy-paste messages extolling the company for its perfection, and praising each and every single product they were announcing. Slashdotters became aware of the problem, and what appeared to be a deep collusion between those PR companies and slashdot itself to keep pushing that propaganda while persecuting vocal critics who raised attention to the problem, and started to nurture a profound dislike for the whole affair. Some people may not like Facebook, but HN is far from the path that slashdot was driven into.
- serf 9y ago
  >In slashdot, PR companies working for Microsoft were operating dozens of sock puppet accounts to post copy-paste messages extolling the company for its perfection, and praising each and every single product they were announcing the more things change the more they stay the same. It's not a winnable bet (at least right now), but i'd wager that groups are doing that right this very second, even here. Techies are an important group to influence, and there are a lot of interests here. The level of discourse and discussion is fairly high here, but don't let that trick you into the naiveté that folks with vested interests here are any more honest than they are anywhere else in the world or on the net.
- j_s 9y ago
  Can you link to any examples? I'm curious as I don't remember things as being that bad - no expectations of any unwanted research just for my sake though!
- mindcrime 9y ago
  Some people may not like Facebook, but HN is far from the path that slashdot was driven into. Perhaps, but I have no doubt that there are a substantial number of sock puppet accounts running loose here. I just wish I had enough free time to try and prove it using text analytics. Then again, I'm not sure it would make any difference anyway.
skinnymuch 9y ago
Yes the leaving Facebook has helped so much or the exaggerated posts of how Facebook is just too evil are a bit much. It annoyingly ends up making me want to defend and like FB more. Even though rationally I don't want to do that.

by Nition 9y ago

bdamm 9y ago

Not owning a TV is pushing my kid to watch a lot of YouTube. I'm seriously considering buying a TV, after living for 30 years without one, just so that I can have a quality entertainment feed that doesn't bend to the new media's idea of what my kid should watch, because what that ends up being is endless advertisements ("open this egg! What's inside? A Ken doll!! Wow!!") and videos of pandas killing each other with chainsaws, then reaching into the body cavity to find their surprise egg. What a world.

jerf 9y ago
Depending on the age of your kids, I suggest total YouTube curation. I've only got up to a nine-year-old but I'm thinking it's going to have to go up to at least 13 or 14 before I can have a serious discussion about just what is out there and how people are trying to manipulate them. Five years ago that would have been more to avoid them from stumbling across the various types of adult content that for various reasons I would have preferred them not to view, and perhaps the HN zeitgeist would have called me a puritan (although I'm not just thinking sex and violence here, but also things like conspiracy theories and politics they are currently incapable of processing and other things [1]). Now, unfortunately, it's more about avoiding the brain hackers that you describe that know how to hack their brains into getting low-level addicted to that sort of garbage, and now perhaps the HN zeitgeist will be less offended at my policy that a poor defenseless six-year-old or nine-year-old in my case can't be expected to defend themselves against this level of sophistication. (Because however stupid those videos may strike you as an adult, they are sophisticated, in their own way. The "cartoons that were just toy commercials" of my youth were nothing compared to what modern kids are being targeted by.) The good news is that we're actually finding some channels where we have some common ground. For instance, they're really digging Homestar Runner now, and I've got some others that I can pick and choose from that we all like. I increasingly pity the "digital natives" that didn't get to ease themselves into this world like I did. I'm not saying they're hopelessly lost; today's article about kids rebelling against social media is heartening. I'm just saying, I had a much easier on-ramp than they did. My first few years worth of youthful indiscretions are now utterly obliterated, because the dial-in BBS they were on is now long gone. I wasn't fucking up on Facebook or where the Internet Archive could find me. By the time I got on to the real internet, oh, I'm sure I could find things that would make me cringe now, but I'm pretty confident I wasn't blowing my foot off anymore. [1]: Oh, and I'm pleased to say that they both seem to be on track to be voracious book readers, which I think is the strongest Step One to being able to deal with the onslaught they will eventually face. My strategy here is not just mere "denial of access", as I am well aware that doesn't work into their adulthood, and my goal is to raise good adults, not good children. I'm still feeling through what my strategy is, on what is shifting sand anyhow, but there's more to it than just "shield them forever."
- Nition 9y ago
  How are you managing "total curation"? Are you always there with them when they're on YouTube, or are you whitelisting specific channels in some way?
  - zo1 9y ago
    Not the OP, but there is no way that I'm aware of to whitelist (or blacklist!) specific channels on youtube. And thanks to HTTPS, I can't even intercept + modify youtube pages at the network level. Thank you, privacy folks, hope you're happy! Alternatively, there is always kids.youtube.com which is weirdly just an app for Ios/Android. I haven't tried it, and myself have actively disabled/removed all Youtube from being accessible by the younglings. Curated media, decided by me is all they get to watch then.
    - Nition 9y ago
      The YouTube Kids app has a really nice interface, but there's no whitelist option unfortunately. I wish there was. It does let you block videos or channels individually, but you can imagine how much good that does on a site as big as YouTube. As you say, it's also iOS/Android only. No PC option for kids at all.
    - j_s 9y ago
      Does YouTube app/whatever not honor device-trusted root certs? I know Google pins some stuff, and some YouTube players are embedded in appliances. If it were possible to mitm HTTPS specifically for YouTube that would still be a lot of work, maybe a good Raspberry Pi project.
    - ballenf 9y ago
      I'd look into youtube-dl. I tried all the parental controls on Youtube, Netflix, Amazon and devices only to finally realize that my idea of what's suitable doesn't have an equivalent rating. There are so many safe for any age videos that have a bunch of kids with the worst, most cynical attitudes and no respect for authority and then wholesome shows with "intense emotion" or whatever that get rated tv-14. So I download everything and put it on a USB hard drive hooked to a media hub.
Nition 9y ago
I really just meant the "I left Facebook" posts have the same kind of feel as the old "I don't even own a TV" cliché, but yeah, I know what you mean as well, and it's a problem. I wish the YouTube Kids app let you optionally whitelist a set of channels instead of only allowing a blacklist. It's nice that you can block a video or a channel, but there are thousands of low-quality channels.
j_s 9y ago
I've limited it to Netflix on the big screen. I don't want the constant jumping from video to video either, pick one and then be stuck with it 'til it's done (or turn it off). I am considering Amazon FreeTime Unlimited as well, I would recommend trying that before a TV though I would appreciate any anecdata on it. Also, a shout out to https://dnslearning.org/ https://dnslearning.org/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14913547 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14913547 (Aug 2017) <- expanding that whole YouTube discussion might be worth your time. > utefan001: This is how my 11 year old daughter uses YouTube now... After 30 min, DNS no longer works for entertainment sites. (Pricing was 1 free, $10/month but I don't see any info now... boo!)
- utefan001 9y ago
  DnsLearning.org now says it is free until January 2018.
jrmg 9y ago
I totally know what you mean. I’m worried that my kid is not getting a ‘big’ view of the world, and is instead seeing it via YouTube, and anti-Trump playground conversations (which I agree with, to be sure, but it’s not a very deep or diverse understanding of the world). When I think back to my childhood, my view of what the world, and human society (civic society?) ‘is’ came from TV news my parents happened to be watching - and occasional glances at their newspapers. Even though I try to consume news from wide ranging sources, my kid sees none of that; it’s all an individual pursuit. I fear there’s also a lack of ‘coherence’ in society today, and suspect that everyone watching the same news programme was something that provided it. When we think of current events, I don’t think that we’re all even aware of things outside our ‘bubbles’ - adults are sort of aware of this. What must growing up like this be like though? I’m considering starting to watch evening network news. One problem with that is that we don’t have a TV - just iPads, laptops, and a projector for watching movies. I’ve also subscribed to a delivery of the newspaper on Sunday (though it’s been a month and it’s never actually been successfully delivered to my home yet...) Who’d’ve thought we’d be lamenting the decline of TV the same way our parents lamented the decline of newspapers?!
- smallnamespace 9y ago
  Yep. My FB feed seems to be 50% pictures of food and travel and 50% anti-Trump articles. Even if you agree with the general sentiment, imagine a child growing up whose main media sources are the informational equivalent of a cross between crack cocaine and junk food.
mrmyers 9y ago
I occasionally hear people complaining about ads on youtube, but I have never seen a youtube ad aside from when random people try to show me a video on their computer. Do people just not use adblock+ any more?
- unixhero 9y ago
  Sure, but not on my phone and on my Samsung 65" smart tv.
  - mrmyers 9y ago
    Ah. Yea, I use firefox for android for mostly that reason.
- bdamm 9y ago
  You can't avoid the ads if they are presented as videos. It's actually a cultural phenomenon of people making a living by buying toys and making you tube videos about them. You tube then pipes children's eyeballs to these videos.

geezerjay 9y ago

> Just a side comment, I feel like Hacker News is going this way with Facebook a little. In slashdot, PR companies working for Microsoft were operating dozens of sock puppet accounts to post copy-paste messages extolling the company for its perfection, and praising each and every single product they were announcing. Slashdotters became aware of the problem, and what appeared to be a deep collusion between those PR companies and slashdot itself to keep pushing that propaganda while persecuting vocal critics who raised attention to the problem, and started to nurture a profound dislike for the whole affair. Some people may not like Facebook, but HN is far from the path that slashdot was driven into.

serf 9y ago
>In slashdot, PR companies working for Microsoft were operating dozens of sock puppet accounts to post copy-paste messages extolling the company for its perfection, and praising each and every single product they were announcing the more things change the more they stay the same. It's not a winnable bet (at least right now), but i'd wager that groups are doing that right this very second, even here. Techies are an important group to influence, and there are a lot of interests here. The level of discourse and discussion is fairly high here, but don't let that trick you into the naiveté that folks with vested interests here are any more honest than they are anywhere else in the world or on the net.
j_s 9y ago
Can you link to any examples? I'm curious as I don't remember things as being that bad - no expectations of any unwanted research just for my sake though!
mindcrime 9y ago
Some people may not like Facebook, but HN is far from the path that slashdot was driven into. Perhaps, but I have no doubt that there are a substantial number of sock puppet accounts running loose here. I just wish I had enough free time to try and prove it using text analytics. Then again, I'm not sure it would make any difference anyway.

skinnymuch 9y ago

Yes the leaving Facebook has helped so much or the exaggerated posts of how Facebook is just too evil are a bit much. It annoyingly ends up making me want to defend and like FB more. Even though rationally I don't want to do that.