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Software V-Chip for PC Games?
63N1U5 writes "CBS news is reporting that SMARTGUARD software is releasing a new application that will allow parents to control their children's PC gaming, a-la the V-Chip for television. The new software, called WallFly, uses the ESRB ratings database to determine if a game can be launched by the current PC user, based on the parents' preferences. Parents can also use this software to set limits on when and for how long their children can play PC games."
As long as the porn sites are still easy to access, its all good.
Does it run on Linux?
The average kid will be around this "soft wall" in a matter of a few google searches.
...why don't parents just talk to their kids?
The Custom Mary
even less work for parents!
jeez...
Jesus saves souls and redeems them for valuable cash prizes
Its called being a parent. Dont let your little kids play M rated games, dont let them sit there for hours at a time. You can install the games to their profile yourself so that they can only play games you allow them to play.
But we cant have that, no-one wants to do their jobs as a parent anymore.
But just wait until some kid goes Columbine because this thing cut off his game before he could save his progress.
8==8 Bones 8==8
As long as it is voluntary (sp?) I'm fine with it. Parents should have the right to take charge of what their rotten little bastards are up to. If it's mandated that all computers have this then I'm against it. But, I don't have any knee-biters in my household.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
Linux already has the V-Chip. It comes in the form of no games.
You could just not buy the game! But hey that's too simple, you don't have to supervise what your children are doing because SOFTWARE does it for you. Right?
the problem with these types of measures is they don't take into account idle time (as in maybe going to the bathroom and leaving it on or pausing for some reason) and also I know from experiance playing 2 hours of a game when you are close to the end or completing an important part and then getting booted off would be discouraging at best.
I'll make you a deal. You pray to God for help and I'll stop the moment he shows up.
...will allow parents to control their children's PC gaming
Damn.
Dashboard Widgets
Parents could pay attention to their children and not let them buy the game in the first place. Being 17 I can see why parents would just shell out some money for some way to control their kids without having to talk to them, but if parents woudl just sit down and talk, or even better, unplug the box alltogether they coudl save some money.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
At least somebody is trying. I doubt it will ever catch on though, how many parents will take the time to learn and install this program (let alone hear about it). Most parents couldn't care less what their kids are doing on the computer as long as they are not going to get sued by the RIAA.
Gives the parents a little control over what their kids are into and keeps the government's ever pervasive fingers out of it. I for one don't want a village overseeing my kids (well, grandkids now), just the family.
If you give a liberal an enema, he'll turn transparent.
It is also a very compelling argument in favor of multi-user systems.
The big catch with this idea, though, is that this is restricted to only commercial titles, and ESRB-rated titles at that. While TFA says that this can also be used to control "computer use," it likely won't be able to distinguish web/Java games from web research for the science fair.
I speculate that the software knows executable names for commercially released games, and it can then cross-reference these against the ESRB database. With this in mind, smaller catches are that this software will require regular updates, and the ESRB rating system itself is quite coarse: look at the dearth of adults-only games.
"Evil company X is threatening to restrict our rights! Let's all get together to stop--OOOH! SHINEY!!!" -- AC
Though obviously games will be cracked fairly quickly to bypass whatever rating they have (in this case, get knocked down to the "G" equivalent for games--possibly still just G?).
I'm still in the camp of trying to reason to a kid why you don't want them playing a game, or sitting down with them while they do, explaining the parts you find objectionable and why... generally if people are treated with respect, they tend to listen better.
"this is a really good piece of cantoloupe."
computers monitor yo.... wait a minute.
If this gets implimented on a wide scale, I think we will see bootable Linux cds with the nvidia kernel and doom3 or halflife2 installed becomming very popular.
I love these kinds of restrictions, they really help kids get creative and find ways around systems of control. It teaches them valuable lessons that they will need later in life as DRM get more and more popular. If we are to live in a free society, we need creative people who can subvert the confinements imposed by parents, churches, governments, and corporations.
------ Take away the right to say fuck and you take away the right to say fuck the government.
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in this image from the site, they're on a mac, so what's the purpose of this software?
What makes it tick?
...Is self-learning and automatically updated so that existing policies and restrictions will apply to even the newest software without additional administration. ...Is hacker resistant. Attempts to tamper with or disable WallFly will cause an alert to be emailed to the parent. Renaming files or installing new games does not fool WallFly."
.exe file "metadata" matches a blocked title, which would be easy to 'fix'.
"Wallfly:
So it learns by itself what the files are? The ESRB doesn't publish the rating for a given md5sum (and even then, games could be patched with a NOP at the beginning or end, or games that update themselves would evade the checksum).
Unless it checks to see whether the title in the
Just some thoughts... any ideas?
Really nice picture on the product page of a father and son using an Apple iBook...
Shame the software is for Windows.
Personally I would suggest not buying games for a child that are rated above his/her age...
Also how does it stop a kid from playing Flash games in a web browser instead of researching homework...
Or that the kid probabally knows more about the computer than ma or pa.
welcome our new software parents!
Seriously, who REALLY uses the V-chip on the TV. That one was free too.
Now they are talking about software?
It strikes me funny, that you have to buy something to limit the games that you buy.
You could just STOP buying Doom3 for your kids.
When you're a hormone driven teenager porn is something that will somehow mysteriously find it's way to you. 2 out of 5 machines that were brought into my shop TODAY were here because of damage to the system. 1 was a 15 year old, the other 16. Both had P2P and "other" items on it. One machine literally had 90gigs of porn! Take about having his stroke material all planned out. Granted, I'm talking about the blockster and not the wallfly, but either is a great thing. it would even be better if they were in a package together since they both are kind of the same overall purpose.
Anyway, both parents were extremely upset as they had BOTH told their kids no P2P network crap but they did it anyway. Of course, if they didn't let them have their computers in their room that might have been a bit different, but what do I know?
Anyway, this is a great idea, in my humble opinion. I receive calls all the time from parents wanting to know how to stop their kids from getting into that kind of crap.
The V-chip is not about protecting the children. It is a surveillance device. This new software version for computers is probably no different.
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
I for one welcome our new Lazier and Less Attentive parental overlords.
How to use coral cache: http://slashdot.org.nyud.net:8090/~oscartheduck
I can name four games with heavy gunplay with realistic weapons that are all rated Teen by the ESRB: Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, Call of Duty, Battlefield 1942, Battlefield Vietnam. All of these games get a Teen rating because they lack blood. They all feature real-world weapons being used exclusively on humans with realistic sound effects and non-blood visual effects. They even feature explosions with humans getting injured by the blasts, and human suffering and aggression. But they escape through a loophole because they don't show blood spilling. Something is seriously wrong here.
Personally, I consider anything with real-life guns or very detailed suffering to be Mature, blood or no blood. Letting companies "enhance their marketing spectrum" because they leave out one mature item out of many is wrong. Anyone else notice that three of the four games I mentioned were published by Electronic Arts?
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Seriuously, would it be really difficult to end the process tree, and run the game directly (you don't even need explorer up to run things. Try ending it and using taskmon's "new task" menu to launch programs).
:D I had fun removing that manually* before the tools came out.
If it keeps coming back, well... treat it like the blaster worm
*Notepad + end task + quick timing. Open the exe, delete everything. File, save-as. Make it save as an exe. Leave the overwrite confirmation box up. Use taskmon to "end process tree" - leave the confirmation box up. Move it so the "yes" button is directly on top of the save-as yes button. Do a quick enough double click and the process will die, notepad will save 0000 to the file, and it will fail to reload itself.
This trick works with most nasty programs as well, except one seemingly polymorphic virus I can't get rid of (3 updated antivirus don't catch it, even when i scan the file directly off of an unmounted drive in an incompatible OS)
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
I guess I would have, as a child, been really happy to have such a program handy to accomplish that overwhelming task of securing the less knowledgeables among us from themselves.
Right, I was (just a little) kidding, but honestly, my parents have never been able to know what was going on in their computer, so mine was even more beyhond the radar, and I don't think it'll be ever different. Youths can be very dedicated at figuring ways to outperform absurd limitations.
No kidding. Lets just say that once when I was younger the fact that I would never die while playing 2 player Super Mario resulted in me being kicked in the back of the head.
I think its much preferable that these kids get into porn rather than into unhealthy sexual activities that many of their peers are getting into that lead to AIDS, other STDs, and unwanted pregnancies.
I'm 19.. I've browsed porn all the time when I was 15 and 16. I dont exactly see the problem here.
Its kinda stupid anyway.. No such software would get on my PCs, and any software that did manage to get on my PC (although it would be tough to shoehorn this crap on my Linux desktop) would be quickly removed.
Kids are often much smarter than thier parents when it comes to computers, so I dont expect these kinds of solutions to do much. Even if the kids don't know themselves, they'll just pay $10 to the school geek to do it for them.
kids will attempt to thwart their parents' will just to do so. An expression of their independence.
That said, I don't know what I'd prevent a kid at that age (15-16) from playing. Him playing video games beats the hell out of throwing pumpkins at mailboxes or sucking cock at rest stops. (ok those were really unrealistic examples but I'm stoned)
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
*plays doom3 on linux* ehh, no games? on linux? why must you turn slashdot into a house of lies?
You'll never find one better than this. I dare anyone to top that one. That O-ring wasn't giving me any mercy either; I envy, sadly.
What of this gem.
Have mercy, but not here!
These classic movies, I love the 80's muffcut atmosphereover here!
Can you beat this Screem?
Look at how beautiful she is.
Thanks, and remember to cue-tip your nearest whore.
My oldest just turned 9.
We monitor his game usage pretty much all the time he is using it, and the computer is set up in such a way that anyone can see what's on the monitor at almost any time, as it is set up in the main living room.
He is only allowed to play games which:
1) I have played.
2) I do not feel is too violent or sexual in nature.
3) Which I feel will not alter his behaviour in an undesirable way.
I feel that #3 can be important. If you do not pay close attention to the way your child acts after they play a video game, the results could surprise you. He was playing what I had at the time thought of as a rather non-violent game - a space conquest game that is basically just a strategy game. There are no characters, no people of any kind in it at all, but it actually seemed to have a detrimental effect on him and he became more violent. Almost as soon as I cut his access off, his attitude and behaviour improved.
At another time, he was playing what I considered to be a graphically violent game, but it did not affect him adversely at all. In fact he ended up identifying with the characters and gaining compassion because of it.
I think that the ESRB ratings are a pretty good system, although they could still use improvement (what couldn't?).
As a parent, I have seriously considered getting the software in TFA, not because of the ratings system that it uses, but because it helps me regulate the amount of time he gets to use it for. It would be very useful to have an objective system by which I can "pay" him for doing his chores by granting him an extra hour a week to play. Trying to monitor his time on the computer is a lot harder without a tool like this.
I have complete control over my home computer, so it's not a matter of access to games, but of access for the TIME to play them. I would much rather punish my son by reducing his weekly allotment of computer play time by 1/2 an hour than standing him in time-out or making him do extra chores.
To me this is a tool to be used to help me parent effectively, not as a substitute for my parenting.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d Capitalization really works: i helped my uncle jack off a horse
As a friend to a lot of other parents who don't know the difference between M,T, and E ratings, only the video game makers are to blame for this. The self-regulating ratings are a joke.
/noblood /nosex etc. options (Duke3D, Mortal Combat)?
I don't believe in censorship for video games (government or otherwise). I regulate (censor) what my kids see/do, but thats my right as a parent.
I think another rating system is in order for the clueless who buy eight year old Johnny Doom III because he asks for it.
Whatever happend to
Food for thought,
Enjoy.
It's just the normal noises in here.
I've read a lot of comments suggesting parents simply don't buy, or allow their kids to buy, games with particular ratings. However this overlooks one very glaring issue, pirated games. What's to stop a kid from downloading or getting a copy of a game from his friends with an M rating and playing it without the parents knowing?
While this is not a replacement for parenting, it does help some. Personally I've always liked solutions like this because they keep the government out of the censorship business. Just because some parents don't want their kids to play mature games doesn't mean I don't want to mature games.
"Oh noes! The computer isn't letting me play this game because my mom locked me out" isn't something I'd call bad. Granted, it might be silly to see some college student still living with their folks locked out. That "Oh no, lazy parent" argument is complete horseshit as well. It's tough for parents to sometimes enforce healthy limits with regards to balancing acceptible entertaiment and disciplinary habits (especially when it comes to studying) in kids. I know if I had small children, I would not want them to play Half Life 2, nor would I want a teenager who's performing poorly in school to play either. Things like this are just another enforcement tool. Even if something like this was mandated, people have the option of turning it off. The V-Chip hasn't reduced our media draconian levels, and something like this won't either. I know that many younger people who visit slashdot might be angered by something like this, but tough shit, wait till you're 18.
Not because I think it's a bad idea though... I just know I'd get it, set things up wrong and end up locking myself out of things.
Oh yes, Doom 3. Linux has Doom 3. 8.5 at GameSpot, damned with faint praise because the game isn't all that and a bag of chips. Who needs any other game when you have Doom 3?
Mac has The Sims and that little slidey Apple logo puzzle game too. Outstanding variety.
When each of these operating systems have more than 10 games, during a single quarter, wake me up and I'll pay attention.
You insensitive clod! I am the nearest whore.
goes Columbine
How droll.
Complaining about "lazy parenting" aside, there are always problems with censorship via software. My first experience with the web was in high school, and in my comptuer class one of our assignments was to make a web page. So I started looking for links for stuff I was interested in at the time, like X-Men comics. All the sites I came up with were blocked by the schools net filter. After thinking "wtf? X-Men comics are PG!", I tried an experiment, and typed in www.playboy.com, and hit enter. Boom! Up comes the site with a nice picture of Miss October. So their filter would block comic books fit for 6 year olds, and yet the homepage for the most famous adult magazine in the country was wide open?
Yeah, this was a few years ago, but I have a more recent example: a swearing filter for the game Counter-Strike. The problem? You couldn't say "I had good competition earlier from Japan", because "tit", "lier", and "jap" were filtered. You could, however, say "I just had orgazmic intercourse with a dead baby's skull" and be just fine with the filter. I wonder which statement the server admin would find more offensive.
So now matter how advanced filtering gets, you'll always have examples of stupid things that get blocked or allowed through.
Being 15, I can tell you that if my parents were to install this, I would simply kill it. I'm Admin on my box, so I don't have to worry about profiles. Even if my parents manage to sneak something like this on, and block me from deleting it: how does it stop me from booting into DOS and deleting it there? All my parents need to do is talk, it does a lot more than a lame peice of software could ever hope to do.
A) Why not just not buy them the games?
Because maybe you _didn't_ buy them the games, but they borrowed them from friends, or bought them with their own money; or maybe the games are for you, not for the little tykes;
B) Why, when I was a kid and they tried to do this to me, I hax0red the PC to let me do it anyway! Any average kid will be able to do this in about 5 minutes!
I call bullshit, and would like to see cite. "A person I know did it" is an anecdote. An anecdote is not the singular form of evidence. Sure, some kids will be able to get around this; some kids won't bother and will do something else. It's not like you're betting your life on their inability to hax0r the system.
C) Parents should just pay attention to their kids!
Right. Because the correct answer is for the parent to always watch over the kid's shoulder. That'll help the kid develop well.
Look, I'm not an advocate of this tool, and I wouldn't use it with my kids -- I grew up in a household where my dad's firearms were easily accessible to me with no lock in the way. Instead of hiding them from me, my dad taught me how to use them safely and said "whenever you'd like to shoot them, I'll go with you." Not quite the same thing with porn, but that's because I didn't ask. But some parents would like to do what they can to make it so their kids don't have access to these sorts of games, and while this isn't a panacea (hey Bobby, can I come over and play UberViolence? Thanks!), it can be helpful.
What the hell? That link is sheer quackery. Anyone who knows anything about electronics could tell you how absurd that is. I bet tinfoil hats protect you from the secret cameras in tv's everywhere, eh? What brand of foil do you reccomend?
A new study today (say 3 years in the future) announced that 70% of kids are expert at windows policy hacking.
but really how does any non tech parent think they can compete with their childrens ability to learn and overcome. mine couldn't
I do not see any problems with this technology, I think that if a parent wants to shelter their child from whatever evil we create, they should be allowed to do so - if this product helps them, that's great.
what gets me is the limitation option. limiting the child to how much time on the game/computer they get, that a parent should be able to handle without such a device.
but I do not know why we are all worked up about this, EA or one of the other big names will grease some palms in Congress and we'll be commenting on how, yet again, our freedoms are being dictated by the corporations we work for and support (financially).
do you have shinyfeet?
Everyone keeps talking about kids, but won't anyone think of the college students! If this thing blocked me from playing Baldur's Gate I would have a much higher GPA then I do now. On the bright side now I see the benefits of moderation, now exuse me while I hit refresh until the next story comes up...
considering most of the poeple i know who'd use this application would actually have to get their kids to install it, i wonder how many buyers they'll get?
Being 14 I think I have a good veiw on this, currently all games I have must first be approved by my parents. I believe game companies should print in large letters violence/sex/blood/realistic weapons/ect. when approproit so that parents can see what they are buying.
Also these mom groups that are into censorship should stress whatching what kids buy and use. And to prevent every kid in my school from using inapproproit games their parents would only need to load the computer into a nonadmin account so the kids couldn't install anything. While password protecting the admin account.
Government will force computer manufacturers to put a V-chip, hardware, in the computer. They already did it with TV's. Why? Because hardware is much more difficult to hack than software. Look at how much more difficult it is to pirate games for the playstation, you need a mod chip, not just a copy of the game. And that costs extra money, and takes time. Plus, if you try and add the chip on your own, you could fry the whole system.
I would also like an alarm system to sound when the kid tries to play a game they are not allowed to play. A nice loud siren. Maybe the monitor can flash red too.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
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Disabling this is as simple as killing the process, then using APM to unload MadCHook.dll and createprocesshook.dll from each process. An alternative is to blank dbGames.ini, save and set "Read-Only" (though in some cases, this will not work, as the file will be set as "In-Use") Curiously, for something that is supposed to be entirely local, it frequently wanted to access the internet. Whether this was for Database Update, or to act as spyware, I haven't determined yet.
You know something about GTA:4 the rest of us don't?? Spill it!
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Well, to be honest, this wasn't intended to be funny.
As a kid, my parents had the games/tv connected to a light switch so they could exercise control over our playing habits. Of course, this was easily abused by turning off games on our siblings to piss them off or hurry them.
Needless to say, this resulted in some nasty fights between us.
8==8 Bones 8==8
I for one welcome our new free lesbian porn troll.
They are only doing this to suck money out of the pockets of the parents of children. Why not make it FREE and prove that you're actually doing it for a good reason?
Show this to your friends and family that don't know what a real hacker is
I've heard that the help desks at TV companies never get calls from parents wanting to know how to activate the V chip so they can control their children's TV viewing. All the calls are from parents whose kids were playing with the TV and enabled the V chip, and the parents are calling to find out how to turn it off so they can watch their own grown-up shows.
I don't think that's the case at all; I feel as if you're just looking for a way to attack "lazy parents." This tool doesn't exist so that the parent "doesn't have to actually check the label anymore"--it's to ensure that a kid can't download and play a game that mom and dad said they couldn't play. I'm sure that most kids nowadays have enough computer knowledge (or know kids who do) to find a copy of GTA: SA or Doom 3 after they've been told that they won't get it for their birthday.
As for your point about the time limit feature, it's not there to let the parents ignore their children, it's there to make sure a child doesn't play longer than the parent wants. Most of us here have stayed up past our bedtimes when we were kids to play games on a computer/Nintendo/Atari (depending on how far back we want to go). It's there to ensure the parent's wishes are enforced even if they're asleep/out/occupied with the other kids/anything.
And of course, if a parent does end up using the software in a manner similar to the way you described, why blame the tool? Blame the parents for being lazy and relying on a crutch. Using a program like this doesn't automagically make you a bad parent. In fact, if used properly, I could see this making a person a better parent--not having to hover over their children 24 hours a day, giving them some room, while confident that the child won't play a game that has been deemed inappropriate.
I think that may be a major reason piracy has taken off. When I was 11, I tried to tape "South Park" (everyone at school was watching it) off cable, and my parents caught me and disabled it somehow. The next day I found a website that had all the episodes for download. This was back in, like... 1997 or so, I think. Stuff can only have gotten easier to find.
now it's big mother
itza great way to interest kidz in hackin tho
Words to men, as air to birds.
AFAIK the Xbox is the only console out at the moment that already has this kind of locking on games. The PS2 supports DVD movie locking just like any DVD player, but the Xbox does it on both games and movies.
If you don't want your kids playing video games, just buy a Mac :p
I am a 13 years old. Quite frankly there's nothing my parents throw at me that I can not deal with. They are absolutely out-gunned and out-teched keeping me from my porns downloads.(250k/s off newsgroup as I type, lol my parents didn't even know about the broadband connection.) And i don't think this "V-Chip" is gonna stop any of my friend from playing Grand Theft Auto anytime soon.
e r is YOU, a complete tech retard, who's been suckered into spending money on net-nanny, etc. If I were a parent i'd try my luck on talking instead.
Worst comes to worst, nothing a bios reset + OS reinstall won't solve. Reinstall net-nanny, etc with my own admin power.
LOL parents here who thinks u can keep ur children from the "bad stuff" out there are kidding themselves. Let's get things in perspective here, between the tech resourceful kids, and the tech resourceful violent-game-maker/violent-tv-producer/porn-paddl
move GTA.exe notepad.exe
Or...they could...just...you know....not let their kids play the games...
But hey, razor thin safety barrier vs. getting off your ass and parenting for once, I know I'd choose the razor thin safety barrier too...right?
It's been a long time.
"What's daddy doing?"
"He's installing a new game on the computer. It keeps you from playing the other games, if you can crack it, maybe you can get a summer job at Microsoft. Wouldn't that be nice?"
Most of us should be cheering for this one!
This sort of technology -- software meant to restrict freedoms -- will simply redirect the time the child wants to spend on the computer playing games into time learning how to break through the software.
He'll learn how weak the Windows operating system is for security, perhaps even take a crack at his parent's passwords.
Obviously, once he grows up and realizes as a twelve year old he could break into Windows, he'll make sure to consistently use a flavor of Linux to protect his interests.
All this because he wasn't playing some mindless point and click shoot-em-up game.
In no particular order:
- Remove allowance.
- Remove video game console.
- Remove computer use for anything other than homework, if required.
- Remove going out with friends.
- Remove cool new shoes.
- Remove stereo from room.
- Remove driving privledges.
- Remove, etc.
However, removal of things when disobedient should start at a very young age, as in toddler age. A kid needs to know that the parent is in charge and consequences will be meeted out when they are out of line.
Ask my 16-year-old or 13-year-old or 11-year-old or 7-year-old. They don't always tow the line, they are kids. But, they know what to expect from me. Watchful, fair and consistent is the goal. Don't need a chip.
AND love applied generously at all times!
Because that's all it will ever be, an illusion.
Kids get around their parents porn-proofing the computers all the time, the number of kids this will stop from playing those games is inconsequential.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Well, the parents should encourage the kids to monitor their own usage time*, since the software will boot them after an hour, the kid should be saving at 55 minutes and quitting themselves if they don't want to "lose their progress". It might have the side-benefit of making the kid better appreciate the time they do have to play.
* with the help of a $5 kitchen timer if need be
Freedom: "I won't!"
Because most people don't run an operating system on their home game computer that actually and effectively implements this level of control
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
A truly clever kid could get around this thing anyway. Knoppix STD, anyone?
Everytime I see articles like this, there's a plethora of comments along the lines of "Gee, why don't the parents just, I dunno, do some parenting!"
Guess what? This is a form of parenting. Whether it's an effective, or good method of parenting is debatable, but a parent who uses software like this is making an effort at raising their child to be what they consider to be a good moral person. Your opinion of what a good moral person is may differ; and the methods they choose to try to promote their morals may not be as effective as they think, but they are making an effort.
Join moola.com, play games to earn money.
I can't wait to see studies on how video games cause violence after the kids kill their parents because the program shut down the game before the kid could save countless hours of gameplay.
Man, I'm not even that old -- turning twenty in a month or so -- but what happened to a good ol' fashioned beating?
I have a free solution.
Push the POWER button. It turns the computer off.
Kid won't cooperate? Take the power cord.
Do your job as a parent.
Don't like this advice? I guess that's why companies like in the above article think they can make a buck doing your job.
I downloaded it and installed it. It adds an entry to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curr ent Version\Run
It puts a folder on the desktop for administrator that has shortcuts to uninstall and run the program. And of course, it asks for a password when you try to uninstall it.
It's not a driver or a service like I had suspected. It's just an executable. Oh and if you try to exit it, it turns the screen black and has a box asking if you want to restart windows, logoff windows and there was another option.
It scans your hard drive for folders and executables. Pinball had an ESRB rating. And naturally, solitaire, minesweep and hearts were unrated. It missed a couple of super mario clones I had. I didn't expect it to find them anyway.
Okay look. I am 13. My mom would never do that to me. I play all sorts of games (that will supposedly make me go to school and shoot everybody) like CS:S, HL2, Far Cry, etc. I recently bought myself an X850XT PE just for these games. If my mom ever did this, I would (1) put an internet block on her computer and when she asked why her email doesnt work I would tell her to buy a new comp and (2) use a linux boot disc such as knoppix and remove the files to the "V-Chip" and give myself my Admin pass back. Its my fucking computer, I fucking paid for it, why the hell should my parents put a god damn lock on it (they wouldnt anyway, but one of my poor friends has a mom who won't let him play CoD ffs).
-Jason
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For gawd sakes keep this story away from my wife... I'd hate to get forced into doing laundry or some other helpful chore around the house when I could instead be fraggin' the heck out of some anonymous sucker.
If notice that your child is playing a game A LOT, talk to them at first. If they don't listen, why not simpily take away read, write and execute permissions for the directory the game's installed in? Also if you're rarely home, it probably isn't too hard to find/make a small program that tracks a user's time on X. And about the knowing what games to let them play, if you can't tell by reading the documentation or box, just play the game a little. Not very hard, is it? About detecting installations, just checking the size of the place where the child has full permissions to.
Is it really going to make any kind of difference considering the way that the ESRB rates games i mean things like a 15+ rating for comic mischeif but a rating of 13.5 for medium level animated violence the sysytem makes so little sense why not make it like the ratings are in Australia and New Zealand and base the ratings purley on game content and like violence and gore and what not.
I figured out whats wrong with the world , its other people -Dilbert
This software is one of the many reasons in which a kid who feels they should be immune to their parent's rules should immediately get a keylogger onto the computer. I'm 21 now...but when I was 15-16, my mother tried to control how long I was online due to my involvement with porn/roleplaying. When I was actually having trouble getting online through more conventional means (signing on with my dad's account because he never changes his password, using a free trial of another ISP), the first thing I did was get a free keylogger and got my mother's password. Yes, she eventually found out, but basically once she realized that these keyloggers could help her find out whether or not my dad was using the computer to try and fool around with other women (and he was), she eventually sided with me and we agreed to set up the keylogger so we could both use it, never look at the each other's stuff, and focus on the great of the two evils -- my dad. Basically, now that I'm in a position to do so, whenever I hear of a kid stuck behind a content filter, parental control, or anything of the sort, I ALWAYS try to help them get around it -- first by offering them a copy of my keylogger and then by going through other ways they can get around the filters normally (with AOL, opening an external IE/FF window, etc.) If I was under 16 now, and my parents were trying to keep me from playing violent games...backup all my data, intentionally botch the system to the point it needs a full format/reinstall, their data's gone, mine's still here, and "the last thing that happened was you installing that parental block software, maybe the problem's with that?" gg, I win.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 SU CK IT MP AA
If the alternative is legislation that would prevent games from even being released, letting parents have some control over what their kids do and do not play is an acceptable compromise. I see no difference between this and the lock you could get to prevent kids from plugging a cartridge into the original Nintendo.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
And who's to say that someone couldn't just get their hands on this software and install it onto other people's computers that are better at a certain game than them, just so they would miss an upcoming tournament? Eh? And how would this not be a privacy violation? I know if the computer is owned by the parent and all, they should legally be allowed to do that... but then why can't they limit other things their children do that they don't want them to do? And I'm not talking about visiting certain websites...
"Instant gratification takes too long." - Carrie Fisher
Don't they realize attempts like this will be futile, it won't be long for a hack to come out for this "V-CHIP" that allows the software to be disabled, I'm sure kid's nowadays are smart enough to go into google and type "WallFly hack" and find some sort of download to bypass this protection. The only protection if you wish to call it that is to: A - Not buy these kinds of games for your kids. B - If your kids get the game themselves, and you don't want them playing it, TALK TO YOUR CHILDREN.. Enforce the rules of the computer and place consequences for not following them. I'm 19 years old, and a while back I played these kinds of games, my parents were OK with it because they KNEW I knew what a computer game was and I KNEW it was JUST A GAME, some kids don't know this... obviously with that incident with that GTA3 game and those killings..
Why not just glasses that go dark when the kids see something not approved by their parents and earplugs to block their hearing. Even better, how about a neural block that induces total sensory blackouts when they experience something that disturbes the parents. - Andrea -
*It's not what you can do for the Dark Side but what the Dark Side can do for you!*
I would like to know about the Xbox. My son has one and I would really like to be able to have the thing turn into a pumpkin after a liberal amount of screen time. So far I am more clever at computers than he is (I'm 55) since I am the one who makes them run when they don't want to run. He hasn't the patience to watch over my shoulder and thereby become more proficient. I am not nearly as concerned about content as I am the length of time spent in front of a screen. kk
Start Control Panel Add/Remove programs SMARTGUARD software - Remove. Are there any parents smarter than the teens when it comes to these things?
I loathe "parental control" software. When I was 15, my parents installed the BSafeOnline internet filter that blocked virtually every single site. I mean, it even blocked Google! (Note that this was back when I used Windows.) Eventually, I found a way around it using regedit, but that thing was driving me insane for a couple of months.
Broken by a 14 yr old in 5...4...3...2...
do it do it do it
lol, this company needs some real catch-phrases -
"SMARTGUARD: Because it's not psychotic mind-control when parents do it!"
"SMARTGUARD: Now you can be Nazi-style parent without leaving your chair!"
"SMARTGUARD: Because -- oh no! Your kid got out of his cage!"
I am NOT a number! I am a - oh wait, I'm number 761710. Look! 761710!
And a million slashdot nerds cry out in unison: "but, but, I can change the name of the executable..."
"What kind of music do pirates listen to?" -Paul Maud'dib
"Yeeeaaarrrrr n' Bee!!" -Stilgar, Leader of Sietch Tabr
to figure out how to bypass the controls to play Leisure Suit Larry.
it's called trust and respect.
if you respect your parents and have earned their trust and promise not to do something you don't do it.
the fear of losing that trust and them losing respect for you keeps you from breaking that promise.
if parented correctly, even a 10 year old should understand such a simple concept, and they make break that trust a couple times, but when they lose all privledges because the parents can't trust them and they have to work hard to gain that trust back, then they won't do it again.
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please don't let my boss learn about it
I doubt that we will ever figure out - and I suspect that even if we did figure out we couldn't do much about it
They don't.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
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Comment removed based on user account deletion
Seriously. Punning with Zelda ... Give me mod points.
Don't blame me -- I voted for Roslin.
Unless parents use this kind of software /hardware we will not help train the next generation of hackers. :)
If you try to ban this or that kids first reaction is to see what all the fuss is about, instead let them know you're unhappy with their choice of game if you don't approve. As a parent I always try all my kids games ( good excuse to the wife for those 6 hr all- night gaming sessions 'it's for the kids!!!)
I often don't agree with classifications anyway, as the parent my views are much more important than some faceless commitee full of 'special interest' and 'friends' of the great and the good, probably with delinquent kids and several failed relationships anyway.
I believe my kids respect my opinions because I play the games, thus I can steer them towards the games I approve of.
Any 10 yr old kid these days would know how to reset the admin password on their windows box with a specialised linux cd. this may stop some kids but it definately won't stop all.
Computer: You are not authorized to play this game
...
l33t h4xor: OK.. (firing up google or favorite P2P searching for s/w crack)
... a few minutes later
Computer: Let's Rock!
The point isn't that the software as such is good or bad. The point is that relying on panacea and magic talismans can actually be _worse_. You know why? Because relying on some miracle snake oil can make one actually do less of the effective things.
Before you know it, half the parents will spend even less time with their kids, because hey now we have a bullshit chip to supervise the kid.
Childhood is an age when we're hard-coded to learn. We want to know why the sky is blue, why Jerry hits Tom upside the head with a frying pan, and occasionally why the nice lady in the porn mag that Timmy stole from his parents is taking it up the ass.
And as a parent your (admittedly uncomfortable) job is to provide those answers. Because otherwise someone else will. The questions don't disappear because you pretend something doesn't exist: it just makes the kid get the answers from someone else.
Hoping that your kid never even learns that violence or sex even exist is _not_ the solution. And I don't mean just "not the effective solution", but simply "not a solution."
Raising someone to be a good moral person is a very noble goal indeed. But the way is to talk to them. To explain the _what_ and the _why_ part of that morals system. To be there for them when they actually have a question.
Because if they don't learn that from you, you learn that from someone else. And learn it wrong.
If you aren't there to explain to them _why_ beating someone up is wrong, they _will_ learn from school that being a violent bully is way cool. And blocking Mortal Kombat won't do a damn thing to prevent that.
So basically that is the whole problem: not that such a chip is bad as such. The problem is that it allows even more parents to avoid talking to their kid. Which just means more kids will end up learning their morals off the street, instead of from their parents.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
any child with even the tiniest bit of smartness will know about ctrl+alt+delete and how to disable software. some might say that parents would not give the access rights for their child to turn it off, but if the parent knew about access rights in the 1st place, they wouldn't have needed the vchip.
remember back in the good old days when the favorite 2 key combo after ctrl+alt+del was alt+tab? before starting any game, i would open a word document (partially filled in, u dont want to get caught with an empty word document). whenever my parents walked in, a quick alt+tab and it'll look like i'm serious at work.
also, how will this vchip detect flash games. many of the internet games nowadays are programmed in flash.
HD Trailers
It's a nice tool which I'd probably set only to stop games rated Adult, I'd rather my kids don't get exposed to some of the darker parts of society before they have to.
As others have pointed out, it's no fix for proper parenting, though it'd help a lot of parents knew how to use computers.
But stuff like this seems directly aimed at replacing parenting altogether. It blocks certain labels? Why? So parents don't have to actually check the label anymore? It gives certain allowances of time? Why? So parents don't have to actually pay attention to how long their children are gaming?
Where did you grow up? Around me, piracy was rampant, and we didn't even have Internet access back then. We were passing around floppies and CD-roms. If you buy the label, and it gets blocked by your own program, you've got the IQ of a redwood (that's a few steps below redneck).
As for time spent, you could play after school. You could play when you should have been doing homework. You could play when you should have been sleeping. Many children today have a PC of their own in their room, and also a reasonable expectation of privacy.
You should set limits for your children, and presumably you'll come to an agreement. If they want to play more, they can come to me and renegotiate. That's just about keeping it honest, without me having to spy on them all the time. If they go around it, they can't really excuse themselves with "forgot the time" etc.
You can use it to support your parenting, or replace your parenting. But I think most parents are so clueless when it comes to computers, it's more like poor tech-controlled parenting, or no parenting.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Whatever as long as this means stupid parent groups will get off the backs of the game developers. Personally i think digital TV standards should come with a more accurate censorship system, since most countries are about to switch over to digital now is the perfect time to get this into the set top boxes people are about to buy - basically the system should be similar to the v-chip except its user-configurable to censor anything from an entire channel to just a program to just a scene or second or two of video or even black out a portion of the screen and the same with audio. Not only that it should be configurable to be either 'censor all except material flagged ok' or 'only censor material flagged adult' this way its totally optional whether tv networks actually encode their programs but they have the incentive to do so because they know there will be lots of people setting it to censor all by default. This would totally solve all censorship and free-speech issues on both sides of the political spectrum forever.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
I am surprised how many supposedly inteligent people buy into the idea that somehow games (or comic books or rock music or movies) are going to convert their kids into little hooligans.
Either they are or they are not.
Except for the ones who are nasty little bastards due to genetics, the rest grow up how you raised them. You are far better preparing them for audulthood than sheltering them from every little thing the control freaks tell you are bad for your kid.
I get comments all the time about how mature and well-adjusted my daughter is.
Guess what? I let her play whatever games she wants as long as they are good games. (She is enjoying "God of War" at the moment.) I took her to R rated movies when she was small. (I also taught her the difference between fantasy and reality. Something far too few Americans ever learn.) She has uncensored access to the internet. She has her own e-mail account. Her own computer (running Linux). I also taught her to stand up for herself and not take crap from anyone.
By todays rules, I am a bad parent. But I am willing to bet my daughter has come out a lot better than any of your kids.
The people who are telling you that something is "bad for kids" are really saying "I do not want this to exist for anyone". They know that they can exert control over something if they claim they are doing it "for the children". Remember that these are the same people who claimed in the past that rock music and comic books were bad for kids as well. They also believe that if you don't teach them about sex or violence or secular humanism that they won't figure it out themselves.
They were not right then. They are not right now.
"Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
This gives kids a reason to think and learn how their computers work. So instead of cracking games they crack virtual-nannies and online porn sites instead. The widespread p2p use made it hard for geeks to bribe themselves up the social scale with warez, having to resort to WoW items and pazzwordz.
Hey, I'm a pretty good dad -- raised two 11-year-olds alone from the age of 2 weeks, and they're awfully nice kids -- little malice, good grades, the usual stuff you say about decent children.
To say I "never have problems setting rules" would be a wild exaggeration, and even a sort of denial of what parenting really is, in my book. That's sort of like the churchy idea that faith in God is about making moral choices easier for the flock. Making things easy is not the point at all. Moral decisions are about struggling to figure out what's right, not resorting to reassuringly rigid conventional laws based on what some authority figure passed down on stone tablets. Being a good parent isn't about being able to easily impose limitations on the kids; it's about consciously working through this kind of crap to figure out what those limitations should be. It's not enforcing the rules that's most important, it's the act of figuring out what the rules should be.
That's my problem with this sort of thing -- it's limited to following the ESRB ratings, which are only a nudge up from the MPAA's surreal movie ratings in my book. That's the stone tablet model. In that sense any V-chip is taking the decision out of my hands, not helping me make and enforce it. What I need isn't a nuisance level of security to put up as an obstacle. What I need is information to help in making the choices.
(Which explains why I'm the parent who reads game reviews, though they're often more about control layouts and multi-player modes than content.)
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Ha Ha. You're the same bunch of fartknockers who forgot Marathon. The true FPS, that was made for the Mac by Bungie. Y'know, the PROGRAMMERS FOR HALO!
Slagg off. The games are there. Get out of Game Spot and find them already.
If I was wrong, this post would be flamebait.
I agree that the civil war was about state's rights (primarily) but as reasonable people we must acknowledge that economics played a part, and so did the burgeoning idea that slavery was exploitive. Do you acknowledge that there were other factors involved besides states' rights?
:) but I understand that they have the right to their ideas.
Our culture DOES NOT teach that the founding fathers were Christians. Our textbooks have been cleansed of information about religion so that we can be politically correct and not offend anyone, even if what is written is true. It's those right-wing fundamentalists who teach that the founding fathers were men of faith.
Also, only God knows for certain, but I believe that Washington was a Christian. Many of the founding fathers were not, and it's possible that he was not. Based on what I've read of his writings, he sounds like one to me.
Even those founding fathers who were not Christians believed in a creator God and absolute definitions of right and wrong.
The problem that us 'right-wing fundamentalists' have with the current conventional wisdom about the founding fathers and deconstructionism with respect to constitutional interpretations is that our society was grounded in the idea of absolute truth. In the post-modern society in which we live, there is 'no such thing as Truth.'
Inconceivably, this denial of Truth is the only truth that is acceptable in the marketplace of ideas. Anyone who says that they have a superior idea when it comes to making a decision on a moral issue is branded a fanatic.
Let's not throw stones at each other. I acknowledge that there are thinking people on the other side of the debate from me. I happen to think that they are wrong
Where I get really bent out of shape is when the school system, in the name of the unconstitutional * 'separation of church and state' removes factual information about what motivated the Puritans, or the founding fathers, to architect the framework of the constitution.
* unconstitutional merely because it does not appear in the constitution, although you'd think it did, based on what the media says....
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
This will end up being degrating for the parents ( who will come to the realization that it doesn't work ) and the children ( who are insulted that the parents even thought it would work ).
Whats it gonna do? Keep games from autoplaying?
If kids are smart they will easily find a way around this. Especially the smart ones.
If con is the opposite of pro. Then isn't congress the opposite of progress?
So, now we are to rely on a piece of software to do our parenting for us? How convenient.
BDR Gear
Outdoor gear, MREs, and more!
What my parents did was just take a important part out of the computer, that they knew I couldn't easily replace... such as the power cables, or sometimes the memory...
Of course now that's a joke and I could easily get around it, But when I was a kid that stuff isn't easy to come by.
Theres plenty of ways you can restrict your kids online behaviour, Parents need to start taking care of their own kids and stop letting the computers do it for them.
Any takers for how long it'll be before Little Jimmy cracks this software?
This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
it's just not realistic anymore to expect to have a parent at home at all the same times as the children
WHAT!?!?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?!?!
It is hard, to be sure, but it is absolutely realistic and possible to have one parent at home when the kids are home
(assuming a two-parent household where there's a good relationship between the parents, and both parents are physically and emotionally healthy - where healthy is defined as behavior within currently acceptable social norms)
This is about life choices, people. You (generally) choose the quality of your relationship with your spouse; you choose where to live, what kind of cars to drive, how much you spend on yourself, and what your priorities are!
Our family of six lives on my income alone. We own a relatively small home, we drive used cars, we shop for bargains - yardsales, freecycle, etc - and we have healthy, well adjusted kids where mom is home with them.
It's my job to earn an income, and then to come home and co-parent my kids. That means after a tough day at the office I come home, take the baby from my wife, and keep the rest of the kids entertained while she finishes preparing dinner. We play as a family together until time for bed when it's my responsibility to share the workload with my wife. I grocery shop after the kids are in bed or I take the kids with me so that she gets some rest.
The point is we CHOSE to live a more fiscally conservative lifestyle so that our kids could have a parent at home. Our income is above 'average' but I am sure that we could do this on an 'average' income. If it was too expensive to live in a metro area, we could move someplace cheaper. It's all a choice.
Almost everyone could choose this, too. There ARE exceptions as noted above. Some of those exceptions could be eliminated. Got a bad marriage? Work on turning it around! Bad health? Most health problems are related to lack of activity and obesity. Perhaps there's a place to start.
Let's avoid some of the knee-jerk responses, while I'm at it. If you have serious illness - HIV/AIDS, Cancer, MS, and a whole host of others, it's going to be MUCH harder to make it work having a parent at home. If you have a drug-addicted or absent partner, having a parent at home is impossible.
Let's talk about the middle of the bell curve, not the extremes. People can make financial and personal sacrifices to provide a present parent. Most are simply too selfish to do so, or they have never thought through the fact that they ARE making choices. With appropriate self-evaluation, and a willingness to do without, most two-parent families could have both parents at home. They just don't.
This is not a lack of realism, but rather a lack of wisdom.
BTW - it IS good parenting to lock away guns, cleaners, prescription medicines, etc. This software helps parents with some kids, by choice, and I consider that a good thing.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
... but I see technology being used as some magic talisman every day. (And with much the same efficiency as a magic talisman. I.e., none whatsoever.) And invariably that meaning in lieu of a real effort, or as an excuse to not do some real effort.
I must say I see your point, though. We can aggree that a lot of those who'll buy a V chip are good parents, or at least are honestly trying to be.
But, I don't know, I'm probably just too jaded to believe that that'll be the only market. The temptation to use some magic amulet instead of real effort is, from my experience, an integral part of the human species.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I agree that the civil war was about state's rights (primarily) but as reasonable people we must acknowledge that economics played a part, and so did the burgeoning idea that slavery was exploitive. Do you acknowledge that there were other factors involved besides states' rights?
:) but I understand that they have the right to their ideas.
Absolutely. The main intention of the Emancipation Proclaimation was not some sort of moral imperative against slavery. It was meant to economically hamstring the southern states and boost support for the government in the North by the "Free Blacks."
Our culture DOES NOT teach that the founding fathers were Christians. Our textbooks have been cleansed of information about religion so that we can be politically correct and not offend anyone, even if what is written is true. It's those right-wing fundamentalists who teach that the founding fathers were men of faith.
No, its those "right-wing fundies" that teach that the founding fathers were Christian, usually as support for some sort of push to force Christian ideals down the throats of us filthy nonbelievers.
The problem comes in when this has gone on long enough that teachers who should know better start passing it along unwittingly.
Even those founding fathers who were not Christians believed in a creator God and absolute definitions of right and wrong.
I never claimed they weren't religious. The majority of them were actually Deists, which is really a rather groovy religion. All the comforting aspects of Faith, without the apparent prohibition on logic and reason.
In the post-modern society in which we live, there is 'no such thing as Truth.'
In this, I agree with you. Our society has degenerated into one of relative morality and situational ethics.
Let's not throw stones at each other. I acknowledge that there are thinking people on the other side of the debate from me. I happen to think that they are wrong
Oh, that's hardly my intention. For a self-proclaimed "right-wing fundamentalist," you are refreshingly lucid and managed to post without using the words "liberal," "communist," and "hippie." Your arguments are well-formed as well. I hope you don't take offense when I say that this alone places you head-and-shoulders above many of your "peers."
Where I get really bent out of shape is when the school system, in the name of the unconstitutional * 'separation of church and state' removes factual information about what motivated the Puritans, or the founding fathers, to architect the framework of the constitution.
This is where I semi-disagree with you. Public Schools, wretched as they may be, are government institutions, whose (supposed) primary purpose is to educate our children. For 7 hours/day, they are authority figures over our kids, and by espousing a particular religion, I beleive that DOES attempt to establish a sense that there are "government-approved" religions.
That said, I agree with you 100%, absolutely, and with no qualifications, that Political Correctness is no excuse to try to feed our kids revisionist history.
ESRB has always been an unintellegable mess. What really constitutes a T rating? I remember having a copy of TA (Total Annihilation) that was rated T for "Animated Violence". When Starcraft was rated T for Blood, Gore, and Mild Language. Give me a break, TA is no where near as offensive as Starcraft. And Descent III? Rated E. Sure some of the ratings are accurate, Doom3 is M. But so's FarCry. I'd never play Doom3 but FarCry is great. Really, with a few exceptions, the ESRB ratings are a big mess.
Man is the lowest-cost, 150-pound, nonlinear, all-purpose computer system which can be mass-produced by unskilled labor.
even if this doesn't work, it'll make the religious right feel better. Maybe if they have more power to not actually parent they'll stop yelling for the destruction of the video game industry. Oh wait...no they won't.
This is for Home Schooled kids. I would never buy this crap for my Kids. I want my kids to be honest with me all the time for that they need a bit of freedom
here's how *my* parents controlled my video game usage:
;-)
;-)
"we can't buy you a nintendo because we don't want to spend the money on it." THERE, problem solved. I had to go to my neighbours house to play games. Granted, his parents didn't monitor us trying to beat Kid Icarus.
another idea: install linux on your computer and then tell your kid the computer isn't "compatible" with video games..
i don't think Tux Racer is going to have adverse effects on your kids..
Ever since the Windows NT era, I've been able to lock computers down quite well. Put a BIOS password on there, disable booting from any device other than the local HDD and lock down XP. I don't know about Home Edition (which is crap) but you can surely lock down XP to allow login only at set times. It's also very well possible to lock down which files are executable, what folders your child has write-access to etc. A more important point, though, is that way too many parents don't know jack shit about computers. It's never good to give your child unlimited access to a magical black box that show pretty pictures, when you as a parent don't know what the box is capable of in the right hands.
Learn from the mistakes of others. There isn't enough time to make them all yourself.
So the father sat down with him and watched Black Hawk Down, completely uncensored.
So, by the same token, I should teach my kids the "perils of drug use" by leading them around a crackhouse? (exaggerated)
I don't think so. I'd like to think there are better ways to communicate with one's children other than by scaring the shit out of them. (Then again, a 10 year old might think that BHD was the best movie he'd ever seen.)
I think (not being a parent) that the conversation is a good idea, as well as monitoring your children. However, the V-Chip for games is rather Orwellian sounding. I'd rather give them some latitude, and allow them to make their own mistakes.
(Then again, I don't have children. And of course, this is all in the assumption that they do not exhibit "erratic" behavior, or the inabiltiy to differentiate entertainment from reality.)
After reading through some comments, I think this is a great option for parents. Every kid is different. Some kids obey the rules to the tee. Some kids know the rules and see how far they can be bent. While other have a blatant disregard for the rules. I believe that this type of software is great for any parent with very young children that are just starting to use the computer. I have one computer that runs Windows in my house and I have a couple of games on it, as does my wife. There are also a few games installed for my kids (ages 2 and 4). Therorectically, I could have this installed for specific users so that my daughter could play Barbie and Sesame Street, but if she were to accidentally click on one of my installed games, it does nothing. I think that this is NOT a substitute for communicating with your kids about what they do on the computer. And for the other trolls, an experienced computer tech/admin could set permissions on the games so they don't run as certain users. And there are very bright kids that know how to run Offline NT passwd crack to circumvent such software, in which case, you should communicate ALOT with your child to apply there skills toward a creative and positive purpose (a Linux user group would be a good start). Anyway, the moral of my rant, communicate with your kids, you don't have to be savvy-er than your computer using teen, just in tune with what they are up to. I haven't seen the software, but i give the idea two thumbs up.
If it can go wrong it wnetscape: Segmentation Fault, Core dumped
Ah, the good old days with keylocks on PCs... no need for silly software.
support for some sort of push to force Christian ideals down the throats of us filthy nonbeliever
Don't believe everything you read in the mass media. I don't think of you as a 'filthy nonbeliever' and neither does Jesus.
If you look at the Bible, his contempt was not toward the 'sinners' but toward those who claimed to be religious but acted in a way that was contradictory to the heart of God.
When it comes to 'sinners' Jesus said 'no man comes to the Father but by me'
He also said 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone.'
It's too hard to sum up Christian worldview into a soundbite, so the media shows us as idiots. It's an easier portrayal, and how hard is it to find a loudmouth idiot of any stripe?
It's easy to think of Christians as a bunch of mindless people who use faith instead of intellect, but Jesus did not do that, and I am to live as He lived. That's a tall order.
apparent prohibition on logic and reason.
It's only apparent. Dig deeply enough, with your intellect engaged, and the prohibitions are merely apparent.
Don't get me wrong. There are plenty of bozos who check their brains at the door when they embrace Christianity or any other philosophy. I also do not claim to have an explanation of everything in the universe. I have examined the evidence and find that there is compelling reason to believe as I do.
I hope you don't take offense when I say that this alone places you head-and-shoulders above many of your "peers."
No offense taken. Bozos abound of all stripes. Please consider that while there are bozos, they do not represent integrity of thought within the worldview.
The test of a worldview is not whether some kooks pervert teaching or misunderstand it. The true test of a worldview is to look to the consequences of living it out with integrity.
by espousing a particular religion, I believe that DOES attempt to establish a sense that there are "government-approved" religions.
Hang on there. Teaching truth in history classes is... well... truthful. Teaching that people conquered and terrorized in the name of Christ during the crusades is true. To teach otherwise has nothing to do with history but rather political correctness. To teach that people of faith acted courageously and self-sacrifically to flee religious persecution and come to this continent is factual.
I don't have to like the facts, but I do have to accept them. And so does everyone else.
Religious tolerance flourishes here in part because of the Christian world view. At least that's my opinion.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
My job as a parent is to equip my kids to function without me.
This means as it is developmentally appropriate, loosening the boundaries so that they can learn from mistakes without endangering their lives. They need an environment that is safe to fail. I want to help my kids learn decision-making skills before they choose to hang out with a group of drunk teens in the middle of the night. Statistically this is the most dangerous time of the week, and alcohol is involved in more than 3/4 of the accidents.
By the time my kids leave high school, they need to be able to live as productive members of our society. They have to have appropriate life experience to help them make good choices. They need to know how to delay gratification, how to apply for a job, how to work hard, how to think of the needs of others, how to make a budget, how to balance a checkbook, how to negotiate, resolve conflict, find meaning in life. This and MUCH more. I've got a lot of teaching to do!
"Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment."
The key is finding a way to allow for development of experience without getting severely scarred, wounded, or dead in the process.
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
... a post not long ago on the Unreal Tournament forums, made by a kid whose parents took his computer away after his report card had taken a turn for the worse. Several people commiserated with him, and it was not until many posts later that someone finally had the courage to say that what the parents did was right. Schoolwork takes priority over UT any day, and parents need to have a more active role in their children's lives rather than having someone else pass unecessary legislation or develop a useless technology such as this one.
I'm sorry that your parents were overprotective. As a parent, I understand that the world is a big, scary place, and that kids can easy be destroyed.
There's a part of me that wants to protect my kid from pain and suffering, but I have to suppress that part, or I will be a bad dad.
How can they grow unless they try things that they are not certain they can do? Of course they will fail. Failure is a part of life. Recovery from failure is a FAR more imporatnt life skill than acting perfectly.
I hope that your parents treated you taht way because they loved you and wanted to protect you. Even if they were ignorant and misguided, that's better than some alternatives.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
Because obviously, any kid smart enough to download game cracks [what, you think the parents -bought- the games they won't let the kids play?] isn't going to be able to download something to disable the ESRB checking software.
Young boys, historically, have taken delight in watching hangings, beheadings, floggings, and visiting battlefields. They play war games. In Germany during the 1800s they had to make laws to curb young boys from cutting schools to visit the brothels. Violent video games are simply the logical extension.
I'll admit that children do do a lot of imitative behaviour. I'm sure everyone remembers >50% of the lines from star wars. But is that so bad? I used to imitate Mortal Kombat as a child. However I have peacefully ignored the 3 fight situation that have happened in my memory as an adult. Ever looked at ogrish.com and been truly disturbed? Doesn't that throw a wrench into the whole "De-sensitization" argument?
Does anyone remember what they did when they turned 18 and left their parents house? My guess is: got a computer, bought some porn, got a girlfriend to have lots of sex, and bought any violent videogames they weren't allowed to have before.
-Thomas
That works fine until the kids discover this:
A nd they WILL. I found out how to get porn from a friend's BBS when I was 12 and there wasn't even an internet yet.
http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/
I'm a teenager below 16, and I have another HD that I could boot off of, in an emergency. And besides: I could always just password-protect the computer from the BIOS.
Oh, I have as little truck with "mass media" as I can sanely manage. These are real life people I'm talking about experiencing this firsthand from.
It's only apparent. Dig deeply enough, with your intellect engaged, and the prohibitions are merely apparent.
Yes indeed. My words were chosen particularly carefully for that statement.
Hang on there. Teaching truth in history classes is... well... truthful. Teaching that people conquered and terrorized in the name of Christ during the crusades is true. To teach otherwise has nothing to do with history but rather political correctness. To teach that people of faith acted courageously and self-sacrifically to flee religious persecution and come to this continent is factual.
Of course. I mentioned that I agreed with you immediately after the above statement:
Religious tolerance flourishes here in part because of the Christian world view. At least that's my opinion.
I don't see it. Living in the South Eastern US, I've found Christians to be among the least tolerant folk around.
Living in the South Eastern US, I've found Christians to be among the least tolerant folk around.
I'm sorry to hear that. I believe that Christ calls me to let you believe whatever you like, and to live any way that you choose.
Of course, this contrasts with the idea that as a Christian I need to be a good citizen, and work for justice. I am to do what I can to protect the oppressed and those with no voice.
This means that because I believe that the mentally handicapped are unable to speak well for themselves, I need to look out for their interests. Because I believe that personhood occurs at conception, I must do what I can to protect the unborn. Because I believe that freedom from oppression is available because of God's justice, I must work to free the politically oppressed.
These calls in my life may conflict with your 'liberty.' If that is the case, then I must be intolerant of your behavior. Where those ideals are not compromised, I believe that you should be able to do as you please.
I believe that while I am a self-described fundamentalist, these views are consistent with the teachings of Christ.
I'm sorry that there are intolerants around you. Have I become one of them during this post?
Respectfully,
Anomaly
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
most two-parent families could have both parents at home. They just don't.
I shoud have said:
most two-parent families could have one parent at home, and two involved parents.
They just don't.
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
...the widespread student cracking through mandatory "filtering software" demonstrates that those who are smart enough to understand the information they're supposed to be "protected" from, will also be smart enough to crack the technology designed to "protect" them from it.
I'd bet anything a crack will be released before the technology is even released to the general market. It'll become as ubiquitous as DeCSS or filtering/AOL parental lock cracks.
Bottom line, anyone who thinks this technology will pose a threat to any but the most simpleminded computer users (which does not include most hardcore gamers) is just paranoid. It'll be as effective as CSS or Macrovision.
That'll just get them all excited like, and we'll get another Columbine!
;-)
Will SOMEBODY think of the children?!?
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck