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I'd love to trust that my kids are safe with technology, but the landscape for parents is way different now than it used to be, too. The grandparents left my th

I'd love to trust that my kids are safe with technology, but the landscape for parents is way different now than it used to be, too. The grandparents left my then-toddler alone with youtube for an hour or so and I came back to my child watching some truly nightmarish videos. I can't trust the tech, so someone needs to be watching.

techteachtea 5y ago
Web companies used to forbid accounts belonging to children under the age of 13 until what, 5-10 years ago? I was under the impression that that was US law, so I was initially surprised at the rapid fluorishing of child accounts on nearly every service. But there seems to be a "...without parental consent" rider in our laws about data collection, and that consent is now assumed to be freely given. Really though, children should not be using these devices to communicate or access web services unsupervised. You are the parent, not the phone.
- hokumguru 5y ago
  https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/rules/rulemaking-regulatory-reform-proceedings/childrens-online-privacy-protection-rule https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/rules/rulemaking-regulatory-... Banning children from social media has generally been an easy way to avoid the highly stringent regulations concerning data protection in the USA. The FTC doesn’t mess around with COPPA and it’s very easy to find yourself in the hole.
cosmojg 5y ago
Out of curiosity, was your child enjoying them? What did you find objectionable? How did the subsequent conversation with your child go? I always wonder how I'll handle these types of situations if and when I myself become a parent. I imagine it's much more difficult in reality than it is in my head.
- afavour 5y ago
  The OP said the child was a toddler. Depending on the exact age I'd suspect there wasn't much of a subsequent conversation given the lack of communication skills. Aside from that, whether the child is enjoying them or not isn't all that relevant. My kid would enjoy eating ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day but I know what's good for them better than they do.
- faitswulff 5y ago
  My child was pre-verbal. It was a cartoon of a baby with an outlandishly large head with its mouth held open by ravens’ claws being force fed various inanimate objects like doll heads and machine engines. I shut it down within seconds of seeing it. Answering your questions in that context is sort of ridiculous, but I’ll give it a shot: 1. At that age, my kid would watch whatever was on the screen, basically slack jawed. No bandwidth for anything else, really. 2. See above 3. There was no conversation. And to answer your comments accusative sibling comment, my kid found it by tapping “next” repeatedly, or whatever was in the sidebar. Fwiw, I know “the phone isn’t the parent,” but the grandparents don’t have the same sensibilities around tech.
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    Holy shit.
    - CuriousSkeptic 5y ago
      A TED talk about these videos https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v9EKV2nSU8w https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v9EKV2nSU8w
fallingknife 5y ago
Yes now it's totally different than all of the crazy shit we watched on the internet growing up. The world is a dangerous and degenerate place compared to the idyllic utopia of our youth.
- 07121941 5y ago
  It's not about "sheltering" children from the trials and tribulations of real life, what they have access to is manipulative and unhealthy. Curious what your opinions are on the epidemic of pornography use in young children.
  - fallingknife 5y ago
    Well how young is young? I certainly lied on that "are you 18" question plenty of times.
    - 07121941 5y ago
      I think the average age is 11 for boys, that means half are under 11 when they first encounter pornography... also read somewhere that sexual assault perpetration is occurring at younger ages.
hosh 5y ago
I am a parent. I am also a technologist. I agree with that the landscape of the technology has changed drastically since I grew up in the 80s and 90s. I don’t think I can convey to my kids the wonder of the 80s and 90s, when people were able to get a personal, general purpose computing. It was not just that every month, something new came along. There was a wide diversity of software, even among the same kind of software. People tried to write their own. Although more difficult to use, users also had a lot more power over their computing environment. The computing landscape we have now: - we deliberately created computing appliances in which the design of the app are driven by A/B testing, growth hacks, and dark patterns - being able to talk with your affinity group used to mean not feeling as alone. Now, it means those are the only viewpoints you see, with algorithms feeding your view point back to you. The ancient Greek had a cautionary tale about that, called Narcissus and Echo. - My wife is a beneficiary of online “mom” groups, and it was through there, we learned about current toys and interactions on developmental psychology. We got a Lovevry subscription, and learned about the “mental leaps”. Yet, those very things show how kids learn through interacting with objects, building neural connections in 3-d, learning through touch, smell, taste, kinesthetic and not just through sight and sound. The Montesorri method of education lets the kids choose what they are interested, but the environment is thoughtfully curated and constructed, and there is direct attention from an adult. Algorithms are no substitute for parenting. I first heard that from Neal Stephenson’s _Diamond Age_, but seeing how the tech landscape is now, and having a kid, that is more incisive than it had been when I first read it.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  > We got a Lovevry subscription, and learned about the “mental leaps”. All that mental leap stuff is conjecture. I was unable to find any data to support it, and the person behind it (Frans Plooij) was discredited. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonder_Weeks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonder_Weeks I assume any claims about mental development and personalities and whatnot is bullshit. We don’t have the technology to test it, nor even the ability to properly define things in order to test them.
nine_k 5y ago
YouTube Kids is a thing, BTW.
- watwut 5y ago
  That one misses a lot through. Pretty much none of the things I wanted to show my kids was there.

techteachtea 5y ago

Web companies used to forbid accounts belonging to children under the age of 13 until what, 5-10 years ago? I was under the impression that that was US law, so I was initially surprised at the rapid fluorishing of child accounts on nearly every service. But there seems to be a "...without parental consent" rider in our laws about data collection, and that consent is now assumed to be freely given. Really though, children should not be using these devices to communicate or access web services unsupervised. You are the parent, not the phone.

hokumguru 5y ago
https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/rules/rulemaking-regulatory-reform-proceedings/childrens-online-privacy-protection-rule https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/rules/rulemaking-regulatory-... Banning children from social media has generally been an easy way to avoid the highly stringent regulations concerning data protection in the USA. The FTC doesn’t mess around with COPPA and it’s very easy to find yourself in the hole.

cosmojg 5y ago

Out of curiosity, was your child enjoying them? What did you find objectionable? How did the subsequent conversation with your child go? I always wonder how I'll handle these types of situations if and when I myself become a parent. I imagine it's much more difficult in reality than it is in my head.

afavour 5y ago
The OP said the child was a toddler. Depending on the exact age I'd suspect there wasn't much of a subsequent conversation given the lack of communication skills. Aside from that, whether the child is enjoying them or not isn't all that relevant. My kid would enjoy eating ice cream for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day but I know what's good for them better than they do.
faitswulff 5y ago
My child was pre-verbal. It was a cartoon of a baby with an outlandishly large head with its mouth held open by ravens’ claws being force fed various inanimate objects like doll heads and machine engines. I shut it down within seconds of seeing it. Answering your questions in that context is sort of ridiculous, but I’ll give it a shot: 1. At that age, my kid would watch whatever was on the screen, basically slack jawed. No bandwidth for anything else, really. 2. See above 3. There was no conversation. And to answer your comments accusative sibling comment, my kid found it by tapping “next” repeatedly, or whatever was in the sidebar. Fwiw, I know “the phone isn’t the parent,” but the grandparents don’t have the same sensibilities around tech.
- spoonjim 5y ago
  Holy shit.
  - CuriousSkeptic 5y ago
    A TED talk about these videos https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v9EKV2nSU8w https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v9EKV2nSU8w

fallingknife 5y ago

Yes now it's totally different than all of the crazy shit we watched on the internet growing up. The world is a dangerous and degenerate place compared to the idyllic utopia of our youth.

07121941 5y ago
It's not about "sheltering" children from the trials and tribulations of real life, what they have access to is manipulative and unhealthy. Curious what your opinions are on the epidemic of pornography use in young children.
- fallingknife 5y ago
  Well how young is young? I certainly lied on that "are you 18" question plenty of times.
  - 07121941 5y ago
    I think the average age is 11 for boys, that means half are under 11 when they first encounter pornography... also read somewhere that sexual assault perpetration is occurring at younger ages.

hosh 5y ago

I am a parent. I am also a technologist. I agree with that the landscape of the technology has changed drastically since I grew up in the 80s and 90s. I don’t think I can convey to my kids the wonder of the 80s and 90s, when people were able to get a personal, general purpose computing. It was not just that every month, something new came along. There was a wide diversity of software, even among the same kind of software. People tried to write their own. Although more difficult to use, users also had a lot more power over their computing environment. The computing landscape we have now: - we deliberately created computing appliances in which the design of the app are driven by A/B testing, growth hacks, and dark patterns - being able to talk with your affinity group used to mean not feeling as alone. Now, it means those are the only viewpoints you see, with algorithms feeding your view point back to you. The ancient Greek had a cautionary tale about that, called Narcissus and Echo. - My wife is a beneficiary of online “mom” groups, and it was through there, we learned about current toys and interactions on developmental psychology. We got a Lovevry subscription, and learned about the “mental leaps”. Yet, those very things show how kids learn through interacting with objects, building neural connections in 3-d, learning through touch, smell, taste, kinesthetic and not just through sight and sound. The Montesorri method of education lets the kids choose what they are interested, but the environment is thoughtfully curated and constructed, and there is direct attention from an adult. Algorithms are no substitute for parenting. I first heard that from Neal Stephenson’s _Diamond Age_, but seeing how the tech landscape is now, and having a kid, that is more incisive than it had been when I first read it.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
> We got a Lovevry subscription, and learned about the “mental leaps”. All that mental leap stuff is conjecture. I was unable to find any data to support it, and the person behind it (Frans Plooij) was discredited. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonder_Weeks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonder_Weeks I assume any claims about mental development and personalities and whatnot is bullshit. We don’t have the technology to test it, nor even the ability to properly define things in order to test them.

nine_k 5y ago

YouTube Kids is a thing, BTW.

watwut 5y ago
That one misses a lot through. Pretty much none of the things I wanted to show my kids was there.