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Google releases smart watch for kids

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Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#571

Post by kelnos »

ksenzee wrote: post #283
Aeolun wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There must be something you can do about that lady other than sticking a watch on your child. Something about harassment surely.

If it weren’t her, it’d be another one. There are whole swaths of the populace convinced any child out alone is in mortal danger. They’ll post to the neighborhood Facebook group in panic if they see a child walking to the convenience store unattended.

The funny thing about this is that it's all about reinforcement and standing up for what you believe in. If more parents reported ridiculous busybodies like this woman for harassment, rather than caving in and changing their parenting style, then more potential busybodies would be on notice that their busybody behavior won't be tolerated by the community.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#572

Post by kelnos »

Loughla wrote: post #190
TomJansen wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with this 1000%. Kids need to be free and explore things on their own. Why are we living in a world where we think that kids do not deserve privacy? Or where we think that we cannot trust our children?

It's less about the children and more about the adults. Most parents that I know are scared that their children will be victims of violent crime. They may trust their kids explicitly and implicitly, but do not trust the world. I blame 24 hour news, to be honest.

The sad thing is that constantly tracking the child won't help with these problems. If someone wants to murder a child, a tracker watch isn't going to stop them. If someone wants to kidnap a child, a tracker watch is going to be ripped off and discarded (along with a smartphone, if they have one).

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#573

Post by kelnos »

vineyardmike wrote: post #258
candiddevmike wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The South Park episode Not Suitable for Children touches on this a lot too. Companies are foaming at the mouths to get advertising in front of kids and tracking them to understand what their habits are is really gross.

As my sibling comment points out, society is already pretty effective at advertising to children. I have strong doubts that Google (or others) would derive much useful-for-advertising data about “habits” of children from a smart watch. Especially not data that cannot be acquired elsewhere, easier. That’s to say nothing of the slowly growing body of laws that would prevent this. I think it’s very plausible that Google…

> I’m guessing the better “prize” is keeping kids from getting their first iPhone in school - most teenagers greatly prefer iPhones.

This is what I was thinking -- get the kids into Google's ecosystem earlier, because maybe they'll stay there as they get older. That alone is worth a lot to them.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#574

Post by kelnos »

khazhoux wrote: post #373
mateus1 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t buy that tracking kids is necessary or increases their safety. This seems to be an American phenomenon.

Third option: it's a great convenience for the entire family to be able to access each other's whereabouts easily. My family can find my own location on their phones at any given time. I don't feel like I've lost privacy because of that.

I find this attitude bizarre. I would never give my family 24/7 access to my exact location.

Then again, Google has 24/7 access to my exact location if they want it, so maybe my priorities are a little messed up.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#575

Post by helpfulContrib »

khazhoux wrote: post #316
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #106

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…

> This constant tracking of kids is unnecessary and dangerous. Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. This topic is always so alarmist. I have kids and a spouse. We all have Find My and Location Sharing on our phones. I don't FrEaK oUt that my kids are going to die if I'm not tracking their every movement. But it's nice to glance at Find My app and see if the k…

[dead]

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#576

Post by kelnos »

locococo wrote: post #266
mateus1 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t buy that tracking kids is necessary or increases their safety. This seems to be an American phenomenon.

I grew up in europe, and I had two instances where I came close to being abducted as a kid. You are naive if you think parents are overreacting. once you become the statistic the statistic is meaningless to you

I don't see how a wristwatch tracker would have helped, though. Nowadays I'm sure potential kidnappers are well aware that kids often have some kind of tracking device on them (smartwatch, smartphone, AirTag, etc.), and will quickly get rid of any such devices before taking an abducted child with them.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#577

Post by flurdy »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #106

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…

Totally agree. Then at the same time, we have put Airtags in their school bags...

(with their consent)

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#578

Post by wepple »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #161
wepple wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Generations of kids survived without their parents needing to know their location at all times. And cars used to be safe even without seatbelts! It turns out times change. Before you think I’m disagreeing with the entirety of your comment, my own kids are the most free-range in-the-dirt kids I know. But it’s location-dependent. I trust cities and their people far less than wild animals.

> And cars used to be safe even without seatbelts! No, they weren't, which is why this is a poor analogy. We discovered that seatbelts could save an enormous number of lives with minimal impact on individuals, so we mandated them. With child safety it's difficult to get comparable numbers (overall crime spiked in the 90s, so it's difficult to say whether kids were less safe because they had less tracking or just that…

> No, they weren't

Yea they were. The model T was plenty safe simply because it wasn’t fast enough to be a significant danger.

The point is, claiming that “we used to do X and it was fine” is a weak argument. Times change.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#579

Post by kelnos »

logicchains wrote: post #466
amrocha wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it’s a stupid law that was thought of 200 years ago when there were actual reasons to have guns, whereas today you’d be safer without one

>whereas today you’d be safer without one This is absolutely not the case unless you believe what happened in China, Russia and Cambodia in the 20th century, governments murdering hundreds of millions of their own people, somehow magically cannot happen again. Orders of magnitudes more people have been killed by their own government when they lacked any means to defend themselves than have been killed by school shoot…

Two things:

1. We're not talking about those places in those times that you reference. We're talking about today, presumably in the US, since we're talking about a "stupid law thought of 200 years ago" aka the 2nd amendment to the US constitution.

2. It is hilarious that some people believe that owning a gun is going to protect them in any meaningful way from organized, sanctioned government violence toward them. Maybe that was a reasonable thing to believe 200 years ago, but not today.

Regular people have zero need for assault/military-style firearms. This is the clearest of clear cases of something that does so much more harm than good that it's absurd that half the country has been propagandized into believing this is some sort of "freedom issue". It's sickening.

Re: Google releases smart watch for kids

#580

Post by locococo »

kelnos wrote: post #560
locococo wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no freedom is removed from the child. It's a failsafe they can chose to contact the parents when they feel overwhelmed and then the decision from the parent can still be made to not help. If anything children will be given more latitude to be independent. Safety at any cost is a very silly phrase. If something happens to your child and $250 could have prevented it the cost seems very small and the statistics very per…

I don't think GP is talking about money when they say "cost". They're talking about the cost to a child's healthy development when it comes to independence, freedom, and learning how to deal with adverse situations without knowing that mom or dad is constantly looking over their shoulder (figuratively, in the tracking case) and can pluck them from said situation at a moment's notice.

The choice on how to act when your child is in trouble is still yours. It's very obvious to me that a lot of people engaging here don't have children. There is a lot of idealistic posturing. Do you really think a child takes developmental damage by feeling cared for and protected?
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