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When Should You Buy Your Kid A Laptop?

GuitarNeophyte writes "Marketwatch News reports that some people say that we should be buying our kids laptop computers well before they get into the higher education realm. Even as early as middle school. From the article: 'These days, it's almost unquestioned that college-bound students will tote laptops back to school. For parents of high school and middle school kids, the decision to invest in a laptop is far from given.'"

9 of 856 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Bully by GPLDAN · · Score: 4, Funny

    Other kids retaliate by stealing the bully's identity and linking him to Islamic radical websites.

    Welcome to the new future.

  2. ASAP! by Ingolfke · · Score: 5, Funny

    Buy your kid a laptop as soon as possible so they'll get out of the house and download all of their illegal music, movies, and software off of someone else's access point (not to mention all of l33t spl01ts they'll be using).

    In the future youth street gangs will stand on the street corners with laptops leeching unprotected wi-fi.

  3. Re:My kid is heir to my Powerbook 12". by Knome_fan · · Score: 3, Funny

    Could you adopt me?

  4. Re:Worked for me by BaudKarma · · Score: 5, Funny

    13 months is way too late if you want your child to have a solid grounding in computers. I got one of those motion activated mice and ducttaped it to my kids hand at about 2 weeks of age. Mounted a 17" LCD on a bracket over his crib so that he could see the screen. The little guy has amazed me with how much he's learned already.

    --
    It's the land of the brave, and the home of the free
    Where the less you know, the better off you'll be.
  5. Re:keep their monitor in view by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 5, Funny


    Until you trust your kids to browse the internet and use their computer responsibly, give them a desktop and orient its monitor so that it can be seen by you when you casually walk by


    Funny. I give my clients this same advice, except substitute "Marketing Department" for "kids."

  6. Correct Answer by Ingolfke · · Score: 5, Funny

    When Should You Buy Your Kid A Laptop?

    Tuesday, April 10th 2007 between the hours of 9 AM and 11 AM local time.

    1. Re:Correct Answer by (startx) · · Score: 4, Funny

      Tuesday, April 10th 2007 between the hours of 9 AM and 11 AM local time.

      Just about the time OSX 10.5 should be released, and it's even a Tuesday! Is that you Steve?

  7. Re:Bully by mrjb · · Score: 3, Funny

    I understand you don't want to spoil your kids, so it's the desktop that should do the traveling. Like in the old days, when we had to drag our desktops uphill to school and back home through the blistering cold. Which is nothing compared to my father, who dragged around a PDP-11...

    --
    Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
  8. Re:Worked for me by lgw · · Score: 3, Funny

    An old favorite:

    Eye halve a spelling chequer. It came with my pea sea.
    It plainly marques four my revue miss steaks eye kin knot sea.

    Eye strike a key and type a word and weight four it two say
    Weather eye am wrong oar write. It shows me strait a weigh.

    As soon as a mist ache is maid. It nose bee fore two long
    And eye can put the error rite. Its rarely ever wrong.

    Eye have run this poem threw it. I am shore your pleased two no.
    Its letter perfect in it's weight. My chequer tolled me sew.

    Sauce Unknown

    (Reader's Digest.)

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.