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That would put extra effort on the parenting side. Yuck. That's not why people get kids! Parenting ... It's easier to just ban it and not think about such thing

That would put extra effort on the parenting side. Yuck. That's not why people get kids! Parenting ... It's easier to just ban it and not think about such things. And those kids won't be able to do this on their kids because the lack of contact points in their childhood, too. So yeah, just ban it. Problem solved for generations! /s

camhart 3y ago
Parental features fail far too often. As someone deeply knowledgable about the space, it makes complete sense why some parents opt for a dumb phone or no phone and its not due to the parent being lazy.
- kelnos 3y ago
  Is there something inherent about how parental controls have to function that means that they can't be made reliable enough, or is it that Apple and Google have dropped the ball and could do better?
  - camhart 3y ago
    Parental controls/monitoring are an acceptable invasion of privacy. There's been a big push by these companies to at least appear to care about privacy, which results in parental control apps being limited in what they can do. A few companies that really care have innovated to try and help, but its still a challenge and often forces a bad UX on the child and parent. Offering parental controls built into the platform appears to always be an after thought by these big companies. They'll release a non-innovative copycat solution as lip service eventually so they can claim they care. Beyond that, based on how poor their solutions are and how difficult to setup/maintain/use, seems like they don't actually care. The "dangers" on smartphones are not limited to just a few apps. Dangerous content is found everywhere. Social media, texting, chatting, web browsing, video games, etc. Dangers include accessing "bad" content, but also simply accessing good content too much. "Bad" content is found everywhere, including "acceptable" sites/apps. So whatever the solution is it needs to work on every app. For example, loads of apps use a Webview (built in web browser in the app). A child could use an "approved" app by mom n dad to then access the web to view whatever content they wanted using the webview. Its actually a very difficult problem to solve. Think of the headache tech has moderating content... now you have to moderate with very limited knowledge about whats actually being done on the device (each platform has different limitations). And to make it worse each parent and child has a different set of rules for what is okay vs not okay for that child based on their beliefs, age, culture, etc (basically a custom set of moderation rules). How do you build a solution thats easy for parents to use but actually works? Its difficult. A dumb phone or no phone is often a wise choice, especially when the child is young. Eventually parents need to realize its their job to prepare their child for adulthood, so that means giving them unfettered access to a smartphone (ideally with some parental monitoring) so they can coach them to use it responsibly.

camhart 3y ago

Parental features fail far too often. As someone deeply knowledgable about the space, it makes complete sense why some parents opt for a dumb phone or no phone and its not due to the parent being lazy.

kelnos 3y ago
Is there something inherent about how parental controls have to function that means that they can't be made reliable enough, or is it that Apple and Google have dropped the ball and could do better?
- camhart 3y ago
  Parental controls/monitoring are an acceptable invasion of privacy. There's been a big push by these companies to at least appear to care about privacy, which results in parental control apps being limited in what they can do. A few companies that really care have innovated to try and help, but its still a challenge and often forces a bad UX on the child and parent. Offering parental controls built into the platform appears to always be an after thought by these big companies. They'll release a non-innovative copycat solution as lip service eventually so they can claim they care. Beyond that, based on how poor their solutions are and how difficult to setup/maintain/use, seems like they don't actually care. The "dangers" on smartphones are not limited to just a few apps. Dangerous content is found everywhere. Social media, texting, chatting, web browsing, video games, etc. Dangers include accessing "bad" content, but also simply accessing good content too much. "Bad" content is found everywhere, including "acceptable" sites/apps. So whatever the solution is it needs to work on every app. For example, loads of apps use a Webview (built in web browser in the app). A child could use an "approved" app by mom n dad to then access the web to view whatever content they wanted using the webview. Its actually a very difficult problem to solve. Think of the headache tech has moderating content... now you have to moderate with very limited knowledge about whats actually being done on the device (each platform has different limitations). And to make it worse each parent and child has a different set of rules for what is okay vs not okay for that child based on their beliefs, age, culture, etc (basically a custom set of moderation rules). How do you build a solution thats easy for parents to use but actually works? Its difficult. A dumb phone or no phone is often a wise choice, especially when the child is young. Eventually parents need to realize its their job to prepare their child for adulthood, so that means giving them unfettered access to a smartphone (ideally with some parental monitoring) so they can coach them to use it responsibly.