Live data from Hacker News

YouTube has become the world's nanny

qz.com

61–70 of 403 posts

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#61
At this point, it seems common knowledge that overuse of YouTube and social media can have long-term effects on attention, etc. (I would appreciate references here, if anyone has it)

But do we know how we that relates with other stuff like TV or videogames? It would be interesting to see a study comparing how they affect children growing up, or even adults.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#62

For people cooking alone with a kid. How do you entertain them while cooking without screentime? Kid is 16 months. Too old to lie still, and too young to help out in any capacity without getting injured. Edit: Letting them play with utensils gives me about 2-3 minutes.

most of the time my wife is there to look after our 16 month old baby when I cook, but there are occasions when she's not. Usually in those cases I sit her in her high chair next to me in the kitchen, and entertain her by giving her kitchen ustensils to play with, like a whisk, a funnel, a wooden spoon, or sometimes I sacrifice food by giving her a raw carrot for instance.

As I cook I make her try the food as it goes, and I narrate what I do, try to make it interesting, sing etc.

And I make sure to, as much as possible, do everything that requires two hands as fast as possible (cutting vegetable and meats) so that if she ends up getting frustrated and wants to go in my arms, I can hold her with my left hand whilst I cook with my right hand.

We do that a couple time a week at least and 90% of the times it goes well. There has been the occasional time where she was in a bad mood and crying and I had to use both hands for cooking, with no other choice that to let her cry for a while, but mostly it's alright.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#63
what was surprising to me when I first accidentally stumbled into kids youtube a few years ago by accident was how, for a lack of a better term, fucking weird it is. For example this video from the mentioned channel in the article:

https://youtu.be/D1LDPmYoYm4

I don't know what makes this so uncanny, maybe it's the budget animation combined with the nursery rhyme but I can't imagine wanting to watch this as a kid. It's also incredibly bizarre what numbers these videos pull. Was one of the first moments where I felt completely out of touch.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#64
I was raised on tech. A third generation computer user, started writing software at seven under my father’s guidance. A Luddite I am not, but this doesn’t bode well for our future. YouTube is basically an indoctrination engine for white nationalism. It’s more or less what the right claims the American higher education system is for the left, only there’s no conspiracy fantasy to it.

https://www.theregister.com/2022/10/18/youtube_algorithm_con...

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#65

For people cooking alone with a kid. How do you entertain them while cooking without screentime? Kid is 16 months. Too old to lie still, and too young to help out in any capacity without getting injured. Edit: Letting them play with utensils gives me about 2-3 minutes.

What did people do before youtube? Why is it impossible to leave the kid alone in a safe-ish environment? We had an "almost" strict no-screens policy (long car trips I think was excluded) when our kids were under 2 years of age. It was fine, don't even remember it as a problem, even when only one parent was home cooking.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#66
post #60

To my grandparents / great grandparents generation at the time (70/80's) TV has become the world's nanny would have generated all the same comments as this. If you watched tv - the idiotbox - for more than 15 minutes your eyes would go square.

That is simply not true, with television you also had the panic of "brain rot" but at least you could still trust public television networks with not showing dubious content.

Youtube for kids seems to be a rabbithole place where you end up with "Spiderman kisses Anna", very obvious advertisements or very trippy shows while on public television you had kid shows with educative touch on them (a visit to the forest, children songs,...)

I allow my children to watch a very curated list of things and free reign on the Belgian "kids channel" but Youtube? Never.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m also horrified by the responses of parents here who are lax with YouTube, even to a slight degree. It’s like they feel that they are morally bound to find a middle-ground stance despite not having a good mechanistic explanation for why YT is OK even at small dosages, given how it has already radicalized people and impacted the global political order on the basis of fake news? Why isn’t the concern far more sweepi…

My kids watch a bit of YT kids. I used to be dead against it. Two things happened: - One, my attention and energy is in fact finite. Perhaps I could work less, earn less, have more energy to give to them, but I just can't. - There is a lot of good stuff there, and I see positive aspects of it on my kids. They learn songs. One of my daughters knew the alphabet by the age of 2, the other could count to 20. The oldest o…

But why is YT necessary? Couldn’t you have given your kids access to a more curated and education-dedicated video platform instead? Heck, even Disney+ sounds better here.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#68

As a new(ish) parent, I'm astonished at how readily most parents hand off their kids over to YouTube/tablet/phone. I even saw a stroller the other day with a permanent mount for the phone. I haven't banned YouTube (yet), but I have limited it almost completely due to concerns about the long-term effects of extended use from such an early age. Those concerns will only deepen as my son gets older - there's a lot of goo…

I think it has its uses. For example its really handy when changing nappies as my toddler wriggles like crazy and it helps to distract him whilst I getting rid of the poo.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#69

I guess a lot of people must be using YouTube in a different way to how we do. We do allow our 8-year-old to sometimes watch YouTube, after the homework is finished or if sick. What does he watch? Things like.... * 40-50 year old Russian language cartoons, to help with his language learning. * Quite a few British shows like Edwardian Farm[1], Victorian Farm[2] and Wartime Farm. Pretty educational stuff. * Documentari…

Your 8-year old ski races on weekends?

Yes.

We live in Austria and it's just what kids do. In Australia, they learn to swim at a very young age, in Austria it's skiing. He's not the only one racing under-10s class!

There's another comment here taking the piss (with the yachting comment), and I too used to have certain pre-conceived ideas about skiing. Sure, if you go to St. Anton and Kitzbuehel, there's a certain vibe. However, at my local slopes it's completely different. It's just regular people going skiing with their families.

In Austria of course they have their football (soccer) idols, but apart from that it's all about snow sports.

Re: YouTube has become the world's nanny

#70

Yea I don’t have kids but I’ve seen it with all kids in my extended family. I like Youtube, there is content of tremendous value, for knowledge and entertainment. However, one thing I’ve personally observed is that too much of it can destroy your focus and motivation. There is some science in there about brain chemistry and reward systems, in line with what some pop scientists with Cal Newport and Andrew Huberman are…

I've never admitted this online but screw it.

I've been a drug user for about 2/3 my live. Battled with prescription pills the longest.. managed to kick the habit with meth.

YouTube is as addictive as anything i just mentioned. More so if you're in a group testing future services in return for an "ad free" experience (you know the ones which claim to"improve Google services").

Everything else everyone has said is true. I've managed to leave social media, my friends, most of my family, several jobs, but you know who i can't get rid of? Can't even use a damn mobile phone without agreeing to let it continue. FML it sucks and it's never going to get better for any one given the ineffective laws get made which constantly favor everything about that business model.

Post reply on HN