301–310 of 809 posts
I feel somewhat in a twilight zone. I'm not a fan of this device, but I also don't understand the over the top paranoia around it. Why do we invent such absurdly terrifying discourse around kids? If you don't want this for your kids, just don't get it. If you are worried about folks knowing where your kids are and what they are up to, I have bad news for you about neighborhood gossip.
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Why not give them a cell phone but not install tracking software on it?
It’s not strapped to their wrist so it’s easier to lose for starters.
Ugh, I threw up a little in my mouth just from the headline. This constant tracking of kids is unnecessary and dangerous. Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. And yes, I totally admit, some kids (very few actually depending on the locale) didn't survive. But we've traded this false sense of "safety" for kids that are so risk averse it is seriously negatively…
Having kids solely use a smart watch with some amount of connectedness (GPS, phone calls, a game or two) seems healthier and considerably "less tech" than a full on smartphone.
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I met a guy who didn't wear his seatbelt. He was a delivery driver and in a collision at 20mph. His head went through the windscreen and it scalped him from the eyes up. He had a scar all the way across from ear to ear. He couldn't shut his eyes for months. He wears his seatbelt now.
So? Obesity is a way worse toll on the human body than a scarred face, but we don't issue fines for people who enter McD's Other people have their own bodies and they do not belong to you
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Dumb phone?
What’s nice about a smart watch is that it’s basically a dumb phone that’s hard to lose. Great for kids.
It’s an enabler! Smartwatch is better than dumb phone in nearly every way. Can phone? Check. Has GPS? Check. Can route public transport? Check. No tiktok? Check! Good battery life. No check :(
I work around that last one with a keychain battery charger.
This is not a substitute for teaching your kid what to do when lost (or watch is lost or nicked), but it gives them tremendous freedom. My son can navigate the world on his own now, all thanks to a bit of techno-magic on his wrist.
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It's a choice a parent can make until someone calls the cops because your kid is unattended. I've had people give me you're an awful parent side eyes for not keeping my eyes on my kid 100% of the time in a fenced in park. Letting my kid walk to school like I did as a kid is just forever outside of my reach if I want to not have CPS called on me. At least if I geotag my kid with someone obvious people will be chill ab…
I don’t understand why people would care about kids that are not obviously lost walking somewhere alone?
> wild things That formulation is poor taste imo
And I've just found from the Wikipedia page that "wild thing" in that book was inspired by the Yiddish expression "vilde chaya" ("wild animals"), used to refer to boisterous children.
Ugh, I threw up a little in my mouth just from the headline. This constant tracking of kids is unnecessary and dangerous. Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. And yes, I totally admit, some kids (very few actually depending on the locale) didn't survive. But we've traded this false sense of "safety" for kids that are so risk averse it is seriously negatively…
Are you imagining a scenario where, maybe, a kid is walking by a house, but the tracking shows the kid IN the house. And then the parent who is watching every minute of their 10 year old's walk down the street takes their gun and kills the "pedos" and tries to rescue their kids?
Maybe that seems hyperbolic, but I really cannot imagine how this is dangerous. Or is it the idea that parents will let their kids do more dangerous stuff since they think if they can track them, then it's okay?
Ugh, I threw up a little in my mouth just from the headline. This constant tracking of kids is unnecessary and dangerous. Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. And yes, I totally admit, some kids (very few actually depending on the locale) didn't survive. But we've traded this false sense of "safety" for kids that are so risk averse it is seriously negatively…
I can only guess you (and most of the other naysayers in this thread) don't have young children. My wife and I have been looking for something exactly like this for our 6yo. I lost him on a ski slope once over a year ago and I think he's still traumatized. He recently was afraid of going on a class trip because he was afraid of getting lost. This isn't for teenagers. It's for kids that are still attached to mama/papa…
or they don't hail from a culture where helicopter parenting has become the norm. Here in Germany tracking your kids like this would be widely seen as completely bizarre. There's a great Japanese TV show, called Old Enough, (that has been running for 30 years, long before smartphones existed), where kids as young as 2 and 4 run off and navigate public transport and do daily errands.
Ugh, I threw up a little in my mouth just from the headline. This constant tracking of kids is unnecessary and dangerous. Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. And yes, I totally admit, some kids (very few actually depending on the locale) didn't survive. But we've traded this false sense of "safety" for kids that are so risk averse it is seriously negatively…
I can only guess you (and most of the other naysayers in this thread) don't have young children. My wife and I have been looking for something exactly like this for our 6yo. I lost him on a ski slope once over a year ago and I think he's still traumatized. He recently was afraid of going on a class trip because he was afraid of getting lost. This isn't for teenagers. It's for kids that are still attached to mama/papa…