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A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

nytimes.com

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Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#71

Post by i_cant_speel »

tejohnso wrote: post #59
Tehchops wrote: post #30

I think it's less about the screen time, and more about what's on the screen. Echoing some of the existing comments: Games and sites today are vastly different than they were 20 years ago. Games like Civilization, Quake, Diablo, C&C, Mortal Kombat, Tony Hawk etc... were definitely addictive. But modern games like Fortnite and Clash of Clans are not engineered the same way. They are specifically designed to function l…

Can you explain how overdoing it with Quake and Diablo is not the same ball-game as overdoing it with Fortnite?

I think Fortnite is just a bad example. It's one of the few games where you don't feel at a complete disadvantage when you choose not to spend money on it.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#72

Post by whatshisface »

wlesieutre wrote: post #47
BoiledCabbage wrote: post #21

>Technologists building these products and writers observing the tech revolution were naïve, he said. >"We thought we could control it,” Mr. Anderson said. “And this is beyond our power to control. This is going straight to the pleasure centers of the developing brain. This is beyond our capacity as regular parents to understand." A 6 year old's brain has no chance against a team of trained data scientists. We all kn…

I see this playing out right now with Apple's phones, which get continuously bigger and shinier and brighter with every new generation. Then they give us "Screen Time" and Tim Cook talks about giving people the tools to be aware of how much they're using their phones and to make their own decisions about it. If drug companies said "We're discontinuing Advil for your headaches and replacing all painkillers with small…

>Just give me a damn phone that I can call a car or text friends on, I don't want to or need to spend hours consuming media on a giant shiny screen. But if I get a giant shiny screen foisted on me, I know it's going to happen.

Giant screens aren't being foisted on you, you go to the store and pay for them. You could buy a featurephone if you wanted.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#73

Post by krrrh »

mikepurvis wrote: post #23
sleepychu wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gosh I hope not, I can't imagine needing to do this!

Really? I can totally picture it. There are already upscale cinemas that ban phones, for grownups who don't want to look at the movie over a sea of glowing screens, and are willing to pay a premium price and surrender the use of their own device for the privilege. Same goes with restaurants, especially fancy ones, where diners are sick of having everyone around them snapping pics of their food for instagram.

Or standup comedians requiring people to lock their phones in neoprene bags before a show. I was at a Dave Chapelle show last year where he did this, and his surprise guest after the show was Kendrick Lamar. It was actually jarring to be at a concert for the first time in a decade where there were no phones up, and people just focused on the performance.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#74

Post by nyghtly »

shlant wrote: post #44
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #13

This article doesn’t really explain what the dark consensus is beyond just “screens bad”. There are certainly some things on modern computers that are little more than Skinner boxes, but those things aren’t what the parents in the article are talking about. What makes Fortnite and Youtube videos worse than Nerf guns and library books?

> "What makes Fortnite and Youtube videos worse than Nerf guns and library books?" Well for one, and this is a big one, many games implement specific features such as character progression, rewards and even loot boxes that are specifically made to keep you playing. They directly trigger dopamine reward centers in the brain and are very much tied to addiction. Loot boxes especially are literally just gambling. Youtube…

YouTube Kids horrifies me. I feel like a curation approach to "kid-approved" programming would be much better method than YouTube Kids. And when you think about it, that's how traditional TV programming worked. Seems like a good model, given how much of an impact media has on child development.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#75

Post by AWildC182 »

BoiledCabbage wrote: post #40
trynumber9 wrote: post #3

> There is a looming issue Ms. Stecher sees in the future: Her husband, who is 39, loves video games and thinks they can be educational and entertaining. She does not. I'm still peeved so many people hate video games categorically. Age of Empires & Civilization got me into history as a kid and I checked out dozens of books as a result. Plus, the reason I ended up wanting to learn more about computers was to make game…

> I'm still peeved so many people hate video games categorically. I'm more annoyed that everytime video games come up, someone brings up Civilization as a strawman to argue. 99% of games aren't Civilization. We all know people are talking about that 99%. The article even calls out that the parents make exceptions for some educational games/screen time. And yet rather than legitimately engage and address peoples conce…

I think there's a lot more out there than Civ in the "formative/educational" market. My literal favorite game of all time is KSP, not just for the amazing gameplay but for what it's taught me. Similarly, semi popular but niche games like Farming Simulator and the other "%s Simulator 20%u" games have a lot of meaningful content. I'd argue even ArmA and similar games are educational in some capacity. Also, Portal because I just have to mention it.

That said, I don't know where I'd go with Fortnite, Overwatch, the COD lineup, and the rest of the mega titles. You could maybe make an argument for some of them maybe but I don't know what that would look like. They're fun games but mostly seem pretty devoid of anything inspiring or intellectually challenging.

Then there's the ugly... Mobile games categorically seem awful.

Edit: Also, kids should be encouraged to mod games. I think you'll probably find more than a few people who are here right now because they found out how to mess with game files to change what they see on the screen, in effect, the ultimate power and learning experience.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#76

Post by kara-1234 »

wlesieutre wrote: post #47
BoiledCabbage wrote: post #21

>Technologists building these products and writers observing the tech revolution were naïve, he said. >"We thought we could control it,” Mr. Anderson said. “And this is beyond our power to control. This is going straight to the pleasure centers of the developing brain. This is beyond our capacity as regular parents to understand." A 6 year old's brain has no chance against a team of trained data scientists. We all kn…

I see this playing out right now with Apple's phones, which get continuously bigger and shinier and brighter with every new generation. Then they give us "Screen Time" and Tim Cook talks about giving people the tools to be aware of how much they're using their phones and to make their own decisions about it. If drug companies said "We're discontinuing Advil for your headaches and replacing all painkillers with small…

Check out the light phone 2 or the KY-01L, both phone looks pretty awesome. the light phone 2 being just call, text, and the KY-01L having a web browser (though it looks so bad I probably wouldn't use it)

Also both those phones have e-ink displays.

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#77

Post by ams6110 »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #52
sjg007 wrote: post #16

These stories come out all the time in history. First books, then radio, then tv, then video games, now screens. Surely there are some translational or longitudal analyses to see what effect these “distractions” have on “success”.

That's very true. One has to be weary of going too neo-Luddite, but at the same time, I don't think books and TV (on a mass scale anyway) caused kids to have less sex and skyrocket their depression and suicide rates.

> I don't think books and TV (on a mass scale anyway) caused kids to have less sex and skyrocket their depression and suicide rates.

Um, do we know that? Especially about TV?

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#79

Post by medobs41 »

danesparza wrote: post #60
kartan wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are specifically designed to function like a slot machine. I work in the gambling industry, making literally slot machines. Slot machines are heavily regulated and there is a lot of "engagement" tricks that can not be used in the gambling industry. The kind of trick that Candy Crush will use. The dangerous side of gambling is for people that think that they can "win money". But the games themselves are kind of…

You've gotten me wondering: Why AREN'T certain games subject to the same regulations as slot machines? Is that a state-by-state regulation? A federal regulation? And does the regulating code specifically mention physical machines? Thanks in advance for satisfying my curiosity.

Why AREN'T certain games subject to the same regulations as slot machines?

I can answer for the US: Games aren’t subject to regulation because for the past few decades one party has made it their goal to destroy regulatory power to allow the wealthy to enrich themselves.

One party in the US has been completely captured by billionaires and corporations. This started in the 1970s around the time the Koches founded the Koch Institute (now Cato), and the Scaife, Bradley, Olin, and other rich families started using big money to influenfe politics. Continued through Reagan, his tax cuts and regulatory rollbacks (including rolling back Fairness Doctrine which allowed Limbaugh to fill the airwaves with propaganda). Then Gingrich, then Murdoch who kicked off Fox News. Now the US has one party that is a coalition of billionaires for funding and white identity politics for votes— and the only thing that party cares about is the wealth of their billionaire donors.

We’re not going to have any regulations to protect people until we fix US politics and media.

(Good read on the history by respected historian: https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/50/divided-we-stand/ )

Re: A Dark Consensus About Screens and Kids Begins to Emerge in Silicon Valley

#80

Post by lifeisstillgood »

borkt wrote: post #64

I'd have to say whatever the waldorf schools are doing is working. My father-in-law's neighbor is an education PhD and her son has been in waldorf schools from the start. He is the most intelligent, wise, and confident kid I have possibly ever met, and he takes care of a wide range of animals at home (horses, chickens, alpaca, pig). He always seems fulfilled and is always excited to talk about what he is learning in…

Have you considered that the kind of parents that raise such children re the kind of kids to put them into waldorf schools, not that waldorf schools do something special.
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