Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 467 posts

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#121

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

zubspace wrote: post #77

I believe this is a huge problem in our society. And I recommmend everyone who downplays it to watch "The social dilemma". There are a few aspects which are worrying: - Social pressure to be connected constantly increases for children below 14 years. - Sites like TikTok, Reddit, Twitter, etc. are designed to be addictive. Children at such a young age do not have the same level of self control like you. - The longer k…

The Social Dilemma struck me as a pretty manipulative movie. It depicted recommendation algorithms as three evil scheming clones, interspersed with a skit showing a family with the worst case of social media addiction the writers could imagine. This provides huge latitude to exaggerate and mislead. I don't think many people would explicitly endorse the claim that social media addiction is so bad, preteens can't last half an hour before smashing open locked boxes to get a hit - but that's what the movie showed!

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#122

Post by adaml_623 »

nashashmi wrote: post #9

Legos also harm creativity. Perfection also harms creativity. In fact there was a economic theorist who claimed that by introducing limitations in a system you also introduce entrepreneurship and innovation.

I would love it if you clarifies your point or found a name for the economic theorist.

I will admit that a lego kit with instructions is very different to a collection of lego parts and I would encourage every parent to buy buckets of assorted bits rather than kits that might end up staying on a shelf once assembled

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#123

Post by throwaway1723 »

We all are yet to see what this current youtube-raised generation of iChildren will turn out to be.

And I already don't like what I see, even though they are still only 5-10 years old: zero attention span, inability to be still and contemplative, useless hyperactivity, zero respect to parents yet enormous fear of police and other powers that be, lack of personal responsibility, whole life documented and filed in the cloud, total dependency on internet and electricity, so much that they are at the fringe of going insane or commiting a suicide when there's an outage...

And oh if it were only their parents who'll reap what they sow.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#124

Post by JoeCianflone »

adamzapasnik wrote: post #66

I think a lot of people are missing the point. That could be attributed to the poor title, though. The way I see it, pre-phone their daughter was probably much more engaged with her parents and was doing more manual creative stuff. After the phone appeared, she distanced herself and got absorbed by it. I don't get why so many people here are trying to defend smartphones/social media? Isn't it pretty obvious they are…

Its the job of the parent to set limits.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#125

Post by [deleted] »

greysonp wrote: post #73

A lot of the comments here seem to be saying that (1) kids getting addicted to phones is no different than getting addicted to TV, books, etc, and that this is just the latest iteration of a complaint parents have had for generations and (2) this person is a bad parent. I used to agree with (1), but lately I'm inclined to think that this time, it really is different. Very different. And the primary reason is that unl…

[deleted]

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#126

Post by transreal »

As a technologist and parent myself, I find the biggest problem to be the lack of fine grained parental controls. Yes, technology in of itself is not the issue, it is the highly addictive nature of certain software, but on different devices, limiting what they can/can't do is very difficult.

When school started online, my 8 year old was initially really engaged, but then started getting a bit bored once she got into it, and would watch Youtube videos. I was fine with an hour after she finished her school work, but the time she spent watching slowly increased until she wasn't even doing her homework. She'd erase the history on her browser so I couldn't tell how long she was watching for (but fortunately I know the tricks, and was able to figure it out). This led me to blocking Youtube (and all other video sites) on the router. I looked into Youtube kids, but I can't limit it in the ways I want (certain times of day, certain videos), and so I just outright ban it. I also found Youtube too addictive with its short videos, and so now only allow Netflix Kids at certain times.

The best solution IMO would be that I could say something like "these apps/sites need my permission", and then every time she tried watching a video or opening that app, etc, I'd get a notification on my phone asking if I should allow it. That would really put the control in the parent's hands. Could apply to tik tok too - I may be OK with it if my kid has to get permission to post a video, and get permission after every 20 mins of use/watching 20 videos.

Until such controls are available, I just saying a blanket 'no' to some of these apps/sites. She can use them how she sees fit once she's emancipated.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#127

Post by m4rtink »

monkin wrote: post #20

How is this “iPhone” fault? “Smartphone” isn’t good for SEO anymore?

It could be a deciding factor - modern smartphones and tablets are already very skewed to content consumption rather than content creation, and iOS devices even more so with their walled garden & app censorship approach.

While its preatty simple to start coding on a Windoss/Linux PC, Android and iOS devices are not self hosting, you need to download an SDK, set device into developer mode, etc. - a barrier in itself. On iOS it's even more complicated if you wanted to write an app for your iPhone and share it with friends - expensive developer subscription & draconian app review!

So my worry is we will loose a generation of developers who would otherwise get to coding and sharing of their creation on PCs if their first and only device is a locked down cosume-only device like an iPhone.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#128

Post by helen___keller »

souprock wrote: post #120
helen___keller wrote: post #101

We have a natural tendency to worry about kids, if the technology really is different this time, and dangerous to be giving kids. Here's another perspective: are there socially well-adjusted adults who get sucked into it and ruin their lives? We're inclined to care about the kids most, but kids are resilient and continue to grow and adjust and change over the years. What about their parents? Are there adults who get…

Lost years as an adult might be more easily replaced. For a kid who blows off high school, where is the recovery? Many paths in life are more-or-less closed off.

I'm not suggesting it's better or worse for an adult to be addicted, I'm suggesting that if social media is dangerously addictive we'd see addicts across the age spectrum, and I'm asking whether people feel like that is happening.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#129

Post by sjg007 »

zubspace wrote: post #77

I believe this is a huge problem in our society. And I recommmend everyone who downplays it to watch "The social dilemma". There are a few aspects which are worrying: - Social pressure to be connected constantly increases for children below 14 years. - Sites like TikTok, Reddit, Twitter, etc. are designed to be addictive. Children at such a young age do not have the same level of self control like you. - The longer k…

Eh.. I actually not that concerned. I would say the social networking is more of an issue but Roblox and Minecraft are probably less so. Minecraft is basically virtual lego. Roblox is basically puzzles outside of adopt me.. I would ban adopt me if I could.. Yes there can be issues of bullying and what not. YouTube may be the worse of the bunch b/c it is so close to TV itself and that's where you see celebritification. We know its a seismic force from unboxing videos all the way up. I've seen it in person. But there are some YouTube shows that are not just consumerism and have wholesome content.

I will add that remote school adds in a live video component and my kids Facetime with their friends while playing games. I find that encouraging since it's the opposite of social isolation.

Clearly these things can be addictive. We know from Asian internet cafes that they are.

As an anecdote... I was raised on TV basically after school for a couple hours, basically latch key. I was also raised on a computer. The computer basically became my primary focus. My current job is software engineering and I was way ahead of the game even before college. Today, I don't watch TV at all.

So I think there is a big distinction between active and passive screen time.

That being said, when I go camping or off to a remote cabin with no Internet, I find it nice to disconnect. You could argue that's a more natural state for us so I think it's important to take that time with your kids for a week or two where all there is is nature.

Re: My daughter was a creative genius, and then we bought her an iPhone

#130

Post by sirspacey »

sequoia wrote: post #87

Buried lede: > My daughter doesn’t return home from school until 6:30 pm and still has to eat, bathe, and get ready for bed. Perhaps it is not just the iPhone, but school taking up 100% of her time, energy, and attention that is preventing her from pursuing creative interests? As a homeschooling parent whose kids have been in school at times, I see this first hand. School is exhausting . Between rising unnaturally ea…

Thank you!

Our obsession with packing children’s lives with empty calorie activities to “prepare the for the real world” is destructive - to their potential, their mental health, and our ability to level up as a species.

Post reply on HN