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I cut the cable thinking that would make a difference, but youtube and Netflix have infinte content. Back in the days of broadcast only TV, you watch your show

I cut the cable thinking that would make a difference, but youtube and Netflix have infinte content. Back in the days of broadcast only TV, you watch your show and its over, go play.

organsnyder 9y ago
The main advantage to Netflix (and YouTube, with a Red subscription) is the lack of advertising. My kids probably see 1/20th the number of ads that I saw growing up.
- stinkytaco 9y ago
  My daughter, who's primary video consumption is on Youtube, has started to get to the age that she's concerned about fashion, decoration, etc. I realized that she's getting a lot of this from Youtube, not via direct advertisements, but via "influencers" who have been "encouraged" to place a product, either via money or free products. In some ways this is far more insidious. At least with ads you can learn to tune them out, it's a whole new skill to identify where you are seeing paid product placement.
  - Cthulhu_ 9y ago
    ^ this is just as bad. At least a lot of the youtube videos I watch are often sponsored by e.g. squarespace which is neutral enough. But those are unblockable ads, basically. ...just like a lot of cartoons were back when we were growing up, Transformers and He-Man and even Star Wars were all advertisements for toys (although in Star Wars' case the toys came after the movie. Still made them several times what the movies made them though). No such thing as free content.
  - chaosite 9y ago
    But there used to be such a thing as free content. Like the Flash animations I used to watch on albinoblacksheep and newgrounds in middle school, and early YouTube.
    - detaro 9y ago
      It's still around, and not necessarily less of it. But it easily get drowned out by the sheer volume of other content.
  - astura 9y ago
    I don't know how old your daughter is, but young children haven't fully developed their cognitive skill to fully "understand" advertisements http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/advertising-children.aspx http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/advertising-children.as... >Basic developmental research on egocentrism and perspective taking, along with a great deal of evidence specifically examining developmental differences in the comprehension of persuasive intent within advertisements, establishes clearly that most children younger than 7–8 years of age do not recognize the persuasive intent of commercial appeals. However, there is far less research examining whether and at what ages children begin to appreciate that advertising messages are inherently biased or on when children begin to develop strategies to counteract the bias within these messages. It is clear that both of these abilities are dependent upon the child’s development of the ability to understand the persuasive intent of advertising, meaning that mature comprehension of advertising occurs no earlier than age 7–8 years on average.
- robotresearcher 9y ago
  My son has managed to become obsessed with fashion brands from audio podcasts. It’s amazing how this stuff gets into the house.
- oreo81 9y ago
  I guarantee your kids see just as many if not more ads than you did growing up. They may not look the same to you but they're there. Seriously, if you think ads have decreased over time then you've completely lost the idea of what an ad is.
- munificent 9y ago
  Alas, that isn't the case. Your kids see 1/20th of the explicitly obvious ads, and probably 20x the product placements, Instagram "brand ambassadors", and other subtle tricks that advertisers devised to get past our ability to mental filter out clearly-marked ads.
- wvenable 9y ago
  Absolutely. But with a lot of Youtube content aimed at kids, Youtubers are definitely promoting products indirectly.
eddieplan9 9y ago
I do the old-school thing of buying shows by episode on iTunes for this particular reason (even if the shows are available for "free" in Netflix or Amazon). My kid gets one new episode per week, and she only watches from the iTunes library, which is a self-throttle because it gets boring after a while because it's the same set of episodes. She also learns more from every show and can remember the name of species and their habitats etc way better because she has watched most shows dozens of times after some time.
wvenable 9y ago
You might also be forced to consume more challenging content because literally nothing else is on. I remember watching the original Star Trek on Sunday mornings as a young child because nothing else was on. If cartoons were on 24/7 I might never have explored that.

I cut the cable thinking that would make a difference, but youtube and Netflix have infinte content. Back in the days of broadcast only TV, you watch your show and its over, go play.

organsnyder 9y ago

The main advantage to Netflix (and YouTube, with a Red subscription) is the lack of advertising. My kids probably see 1/20th the number of ads that I saw growing up.

stinkytaco 9y ago
My daughter, who's primary video consumption is on Youtube, has started to get to the age that she's concerned about fashion, decoration, etc. I realized that she's getting a lot of this from Youtube, not via direct advertisements, but via "influencers" who have been "encouraged" to place a product, either via money or free products. In some ways this is far more insidious. At least with ads you can learn to tune them out, it's a whole new skill to identify where you are seeing paid product placement.
- Cthulhu_ 9y ago
  ^ this is just as bad. At least a lot of the youtube videos I watch are often sponsored by e.g. squarespace which is neutral enough. But those are unblockable ads, basically. ...just like a lot of cartoons were back when we were growing up, Transformers and He-Man and even Star Wars were all advertisements for toys (although in Star Wars' case the toys came after the movie. Still made them several times what the movies made them though). No such thing as free content.
- chaosite 9y ago
  But there used to be such a thing as free content. Like the Flash animations I used to watch on albinoblacksheep and newgrounds in middle school, and early YouTube.
  - detaro 9y ago
    It's still around, and not necessarily less of it. But it easily get drowned out by the sheer volume of other content.
- astura 9y ago
  I don't know how old your daughter is, but young children haven't fully developed their cognitive skill to fully "understand" advertisements http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/advertising-children.aspx http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/advertising-children.as... >Basic developmental research on egocentrism and perspective taking, along with a great deal of evidence specifically examining developmental differences in the comprehension of persuasive intent within advertisements, establishes clearly that most children younger than 7–8 years of age do not recognize the persuasive intent of commercial appeals. However, there is far less research examining whether and at what ages children begin to appreciate that advertising messages are inherently biased or on when children begin to develop strategies to counteract the bias within these messages. It is clear that both of these abilities are dependent upon the child’s development of the ability to understand the persuasive intent of advertising, meaning that mature comprehension of advertising occurs no earlier than age 7–8 years on average.
robotresearcher 9y ago
My son has managed to become obsessed with fashion brands from audio podcasts. It’s amazing how this stuff gets into the house.
oreo81 9y ago
I guarantee your kids see just as many if not more ads than you did growing up. They may not look the same to you but they're there. Seriously, if you think ads have decreased over time then you've completely lost the idea of what an ad is.
munificent 9y ago
Alas, that isn't the case. Your kids see 1/20th of the explicitly obvious ads, and probably 20x the product placements, Instagram "brand ambassadors", and other subtle tricks that advertisers devised to get past our ability to mental filter out clearly-marked ads.
wvenable 9y ago
Absolutely. But with a lot of Youtube content aimed at kids, Youtubers are definitely promoting products indirectly.

eddieplan9 9y ago

I do the old-school thing of buying shows by episode on iTunes for this particular reason (even if the shows are available for "free" in Netflix or Amazon). My kid gets one new episode per week, and she only watches from the iTunes library, which is a self-throttle because it gets boring after a while because it's the same set of episodes. She also learns more from every show and can remember the name of species and their habitats etc way better because she has watched most shows dozens of times after some time.

wvenable 9y ago

You might also be forced to consume more challenging content because literally nothing else is on. I remember watching the original Star Trek on Sunday mornings as a young child because nothing else was on. If cartoons were on 24/7 I might never have explored that.