Slashdot Mirror
Internet-Deprived Kids Turning To 'McLibraries'
theodp writes "After the school computer lab and public library close for the night in many communities, the local McDonald's is often the only place to turn for students without internet access at home. 'Cheap smartphones and tablets have put Web-ready technology into more hands than ever,' reports the WSJ's Anton Troianovski. 'But the price of Internet connectivity hasn't come down nearly as quickly. And in many rural areas, high-speed Internet through traditional phone lines simply isn't available at any price. The result is a divide between families that have broadband constantly available on their home computers and phones, and those that have to plan their days around visits to free sources of Internet access.' The FCC says it can make broadband available to all Americans by spending $45 billion over 10 years, but until then the U.S. will have to rely on Mickey D's, Starbucks, and others to help address its digital divide. Time to update that iconic McDonald's sign?"
Children's asses are so tight and good. Just by inserting my microscopic cock into a defenseless child's ass, I instantly let loose my little white tadpole friends right inside his/her ass. Ah! Too good!
Deprivation of Internet - a common cause of picking bad eating habits at low ages for Homo sapiens.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
This is why we should always fight to keep libraries open. It's all very well fast food restaurants having free wifi, but you have to provide the device yourself.
Libraries, with a few PCs you can use are the answer. Where libraries are closed, we should look into re-opening them. If the buildings are not available then we can "re-purpose" church halls maybe a few nights a week as internet centres for the poor, using donated PCs.
If McDonald's can do it for free, then by all means, spend the 45 billion and teach them a lesson!
I rtfa and am quite suprised by what passes for 'poor'. Seems more like people who don't know how to budget and set priorities. Judging by the amount of debt the US has, sounds like par for the course.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
A Big Mac is about $4. How do these kids have money for McDonald's but can't afford a low end data plan? T-Mobile has unlimited talk, text and data (2G speed after 200MB) for $3 a day.
As governments around Europe are ruling access to the Internet to be a human right, in the US, our poor must send their children to a fast food restaurant for their needed Internet access.
We're quite an odd nation!
Given that the McDs connections are pretty fast, and pretty reliable, it's actually handy to use as a backup.
Couple of years ago the connection at home was being flaky and finally gave out. Problem was, it was a major DR test day at work, and I needed to be online from home for 12 or so hours.
I just grabbed the laptop, blackberry, and powercord, and went 5 mins down the road to the 24hour McDs. Sat there for hours til my ass was numb, happily on my work BB using hands-free, and worked away for hours.
I wasn't disturbed, had unlimited food and drinks available. Really, not the worst place to work at all. I had more space there than I get at my desk job, and better food and drinks too. Work don't have iced tea on tap.
The McDs connection was enough to remote desktop into my XP desktop at work, without lag or dropping. I was impressed how stable it was. Most places can't handle basic browsing that well given the number of people sharing, but that was totally solid.
These poor kids cant possibly afford internet, but somehow dress better than me, have a better celphone than me, and have a tablet to boot
my bad I thought a 80$ a month phone was MORE EXPENSIVE than 20$ a month internet
... what does it take to set up and maintain a McDonald's style wifi installation? Does anyone here know?
I would think that $45 Billion dollars is a very, very high estimate, for a project that would provide adequate minimal access to wifi around the country, and I am almost sure that McD's didn't spend $45 Billion dollars.
The cable company wants at least $10000 to extend to my house, not even a 1/4 mile outside their coverage area. I look at the telephone poles recently down the road, and there are new strands of cable co wiring on top of already existing cable co wiring and I am sure only one cable company exists. They could have used that labor and wire to extend to my house instead. Even if I paid them the money what guarantee do I have to the viability of the signal for both internet & TV and what if a storm takes it down? Oh, and all the wasted dollars on stuff like "free wifi" from the same cable companies they could have used a fraction to expand their coverage area. Oh wait, what the fuck is all that USF money going towards????
Our options are 3G data plans, satellite and dial-up. All are shitty, at times 3G is no better than dial-up and the connection keeps getting dropped and shitty unusable speeds during the day. I try not to do any important financial or other transactions during the day as a dropped connection would be bad news. Many of these sites don't respond nicely to have to reload the page, I could be double charged or something and may have to spend time and gas with the bank to clear that up, more money out of my pocket kept from spending on goods on which our economy relies so heavily on.
See, the free market came through where government did not.
Futurist Traditionalism
the thick rigid ones are called textbooks, the thin sheets with blue lines on them are called paper.
Kids without internet access at home can take a break from Facebook and Youtube and maybe, oh I don't know, study? Do homework?
Probably too much to ask though.
FTA "Jennifer LaBrenz, a single mom who has take-home income of roughly $2,000 a month, a year ago was paying close to $300 a month for home phone and Internet, satellite television and smartphones for herself and her oldest daughter."
I earn roughly the same salary and dont have sat or cable tv. I also don't give my kids smartphones, a simple pre-paid plan so I can call them is enough. I also dont drive an SUV so I dont pay as much on gas.
A side benefit is that instead of watching TV I interact with my family and my kids aren't busy tooling around on their phone so we can help them with their homework and actually talk with them
Reading this article confirms that some people are poor by their own choosing (or poor choosing).
We're all not entitled to live like kings, so stop fucking thinking that you can.
I've noticed recently that we need a fastfood.slashdot.org, there have been a few fastfood related stories recently
getting an education 20+ years ago -- without the internet.
So, what the fuck is the problem here?
I fail to see why these kids are going to McDonalds instead of to the library. Libraries even have open access computers so you don't have to buy your children tablets when you supposedly cant afford to keep an internet connection.
Yet another ./ thread overrun by relatively comfortable people smugly defining "poverty", and pontificating as to how the poor either aren't really poor or should just suck it up. Sad.
I'm not surprised at all. Capitalism at its very best! Pffft! I hate Big Telecom!
Once again (like in the 80's)Apple was focusing on the "classes" - selling overpriced but stylish tech to those that can afford it, while Commodore et al. sold cheap but functional computers that were purchased by everyone, and brought technology and often education, to the masses.
We are seeing the repeat of this scenario, where Apple sells overpriced but stylish tech (someone wants to challenge me on overpriced? Bring it on, the margins on the iPhone 5 are particularly succulent data) with the iPhones and iPads, and the more well-off are their customers, even according to some research. Enter Android, a free (and opensource) OS that anyone is free to use however they see fit. An deluge of Android-powered devices include smart watches, cameras, mini PCs, consoles, and of course smartphones and tablets. And among the latter two, we see both ultra-expensive ones (Vertu), high-tech ones (Samsung Galaxy S-III, Note II, etc) and... ultra cheap ones, both from known brands such as HTC, and Samsung, and from no-name Chinese companies. The latter is the one that brings tech to the masses, and for this, I am grateful to Android.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
if people are needing internet access to certain sites, maybe its time for a mobile browser that caches, big-style. Interactive sites like facebook, twitter etc can't be usefully cached as the usage is based on direct and timely interaction,but a lot of recreational reading, news, sports, humour and weather could be. A browser set to download 4 links' deep of on-site content for certain predefined sites could save a lot of material in a few minutes to be perused at leisure offline
Back when we only had dial-up and paid per minute this wasnt uncommon. As a solution to make the best and most efficient use of a scare commodity (connectivity) its still relevant.
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
Sorry, liberals don't like it when the churches do things like "donating free space" to help people. They throw hissy fits, and start screaming about a separation of church and state. Well at least they do in the US, never mind that in Canada that churches and synagogues have been doing this up here for the better part of a decade already and it's open to the public.
We only care when government money is used to maintain such services, or are the only places for those public services to be available.
How comfortable would you be if the only place in your town that had free internet was a mosque?
Hmmm. Don't think you are a troll, so I'm going to toss you a peanut or two to munch on. Haven't you heard of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, created by Bush II more than a decade ago? True, Bush used it as a sly way to fund get-out-the-vote programs targeted at GOP constituencies and faced some serious blowback when his first director of the office, John Dilulio, resigned in protest over the political agenda that permeated an ostensibly apolitical office. The office was expanded and renamed the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships by that arch-liberal, Obama. The OFBNP has funneled billions of dollars of tax money into exactly the kind of social services that you are referring to, via competitive contracts awarded and monitored by a council of secular and religious leaders from around the country.
I don't think liberals care much at all about *who* is helping redistribute the nation's wealth, as long as it gets redistributed in a way that benefits all, and not just a few. It's a great idea, really, letting churches help. Conservatives who don't like to redistribute wealth in any direction but upwards would look pretty silly if they tried to block money doing God's work, wouldn't you agree?
My question is, why haven't they finished their homework by the time the public library closes? The public libraries around me are open until 9 or 10 pm. You should be able to finish your homework long before then.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
But that's okay, because what's another 45-billion dollars when we already have 17 trillion and counting in debt? Heck, let's just throw a free seat on the space shuttle for everyone to ride to the moon because it's everyone's right to go there. The internet is not required, even in silicon valley. I have lived in silicon valley for almost a decade now and have even spent 2-years without it. There are still libraries even in school. What schools need to do is provide the means to do homework without the internet. I used to have encyclopedias at home, but now people rely too heavily on the internet to do the work for them. I'm not saying the internet is bad, hell, I make a good profit off of building websites but it's just propraganda. People don't need the internet to get by these days. Is it useful? Absolutely! Would it be bad if we didn't have it? 99% of teenagers wouldn't get to see porn and that would make them sad but not me. Can people get around without the internet? Without a doubt.
The article says these kids go to McDonalds after the public library closes (where they already get free Internet access).
If this is really such a hardship, why not keep school and/or the public library open a little longer?
So, you need 650 dollars up front in your simplistic example. Gas/electricity of course just arrives for free and has no upfront costs in your silly world of moronic idiots who don't know what they are talking about.
Being poor is about not HAVING any money to spend. A classic example is the washing machine. Going to a laundromat is far more expensive AND time consuming but until you can afford the upfront cost of a washing machine, you have little choice but to try to save up for one while spending the higher amount of laundromat. Say you got a budget of 10 dollars for laundry per week. The laundromat costs 9.50, using your own washing machine costs 500 up front and 5 dollars per wash.
The person who doesn't have 500 dollars, has to use the laundromat and can only save up 50 cents per week. To save up the 500 dollars needed to buy a washing machine, takes years.
That is assuming said person even lives somewhere where it is possible/allowed to run a washing machine. A moron like Solandri will no doubt suggest to not wash your clothes and save up for 50 weeks those 10 dollars and then buy a washing machine. No doubt as the spoiled little rich white kid he will just say to get your mom to do it. He did. But if you do not wash your clothes for a year, you will go through clothes a LOT faster and most likely loose whatever job you have.
It is well known that the richer you are, the cheaper you can life. Even Terry Pratchett wrote about it with Sam Vimes Boots theory of economic injustice. It goes something like this: If you can afford 100 dollars for a pair of boots, you will have a pair of boots that will keep your feet dry for your life and can pass on to your children. If you can only afford a 10 dollar pair, they will leak with in six months and begone in a year. So the poor man spends more on boots then the rich men but still has wet feet. And no, you can't go for 10 years without boots to save up for a good pair.
What morons like Solandri fail to understand is that being poor means you don't have money. You would think this is fairly easy to understand concept but people like Solandri are really dumb indeed, they think poor people just want to be poor and could just get the money somewhere by magic if only they tried.
You can see how stupid Solandri is by not including the fixed costs of utility services, they charge a flat fee on top of which you pay for actual usage. He is a classic spoiled little rich kid who moans about the poor but doesn't know the price of milk.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Actually, the real problem is that America refuses to provide a "living wage" for most entry-level positions and that you guys have no remedial social system. Over here (Germany), long-term unemployed people get a housing benefit where they have a small flat including a full kitchen and a communal washer dryer. On Hartz IV (long-term unemployment) in Germany, people can live on roughly €400/mo with this housing benefit. Maybe it's not pleasant, but it sure is better than sending people to McDs for €1 hamburgers. In addition, it's cheaper in the long run. You guys need to gain some long-term perspective.
Really now, I dont even understand why most libraries are still open. Like I have two of them in my area that is farily well populated and no one hardly ever goes in them. Even despite the new and improved library they build that is like 3 stories high its still not used much.
Libraries in this day and age are a waste. Waste of building space, waste of money, waste of manpower and so on. If it werent for free internet and the fact you can borrow dvds for the poor and stupid trailer trash in my area no one would go.
And really now lets face facts. Libraries are useless and no one "needs" them. 20-30 years ago when I was in school we didnt have the internet in our area even for anyone at all and my entire middle and high school learned to graduate and learn just fine without the use of it. I fail to see why kids today cant learn without it as well. Hell we had a library right next to our school and the school itself had a library and none of the students actually used either unless their class had to go to one. We sat in there to do homework sometimes and once or twice a year check out a book to do a report on and thats it.
This whole "We need the internet!" mentality is stupid. You dont need it, you just have gotten lazy and stupid so you want it because you dont want to have to actually remember things. But you certainly dont need it and neither do kids. We have managed to learn the basics in schools for a very long time now without it.
I would actually argue the internet is bad for students. It gives them too much information, a great deal which is 100% false. School for kids is meant to teach them fundamentals for different fields of study and to lean proper social interactions. I say you dont need the internet for either one at all. What kids need to learn at school should be more linear and constructed, when you open the internet into things you add in too many abstracts that water down the whole learning experince.
McDonalds has rigid lobby designs that don't include electrical outlets anywhere customer-accessible. This means kids (and adults) get to stop using the Internet when their battery dies. This is in contrast to Starbucks, etc. which try to provide as many outlets as possible. McDonalds is in the 'net cafe business only grudgingly.
Much of the USA has trouble getting broadband because the population density of rural areas makes it too expensive do the "last mile" connection of broadband to the home. This isn't like South Korea or Japan, where the population density is high enough per square kilometer to justify the enormous expense of hardwired high-speed Internet connections to everyone.
I think if the IRS were to offer substantial corporate tax incentives to get the "last mile" connection--whether by DSL, cable or even long-range wireless not tied to cellphones like 802.16 WiMax--out to rural customers, they could solve the problem pretty quickly.
Ten years ago I was overnighting in a Starbucks parking lot to send my work in. I was one of many living in vehicles and roaming the US, doing a bit of work here or there. Most of the venues mentioned here were our links to the internet - to our bread and butter. But that's nothing new around the globe, most of the under-developing part of the world has been going to community wifi centers for a long time. I'm in Nepal now, and there is a cybercenter on almost every block within the Kathmandu valley (mostly filled with students). But the sad thing is this: America has not progressed to this point: where even the poor can afford an internet connection in the home, and can certainly find an affordable cyber center within walking distance.
I think therefore I can't be ~TTNH
In many locations politicians of dubious ethics and room temperature intelligence, have passed laws
to make it illegal and/or impossible to build a community wifi.
I realize there are some technicalities and costs to amortize, but really! so what?
Compared to expecting kids to hang out in fast food joints so they can do homework, or look for a job online,
how can communities really believe that some shared wifi is a bad thing?
It's mostly the "asleep at the wheel" voters fault, that's us folks...
These messed up laws should be reversed at the Federal and/or State level immediately and
funding provided to make community wifi and broadband happen.
Plus some serious people tasked and responsible to make sure it actually does and report progress frequently, this is already way overdue.
We have to choose between allowing our leaders to force us into either:
a third world style information access (no access)
or having a well educated and employed society.
Patriotism, basic community spirit, ethics, makes this seem like a no brainer to me.
IMHO, there can be no excuses, no apologistas, no rationalizations that justify continuing a monopoly at the expense of the USA's future generations.
The way I see it, this is also part of the rich corporations strategy to dumb down America, and we need to make an effort to buy/bribe the politicians into changing their "screw the people, if it helps me get re-elected" laws.
The Europeans have it defined correctly, internet access is now a basic right, a need.
Suggested action: Let your political critters know that voting for this kind of dumb stuff, is not acceptable, if they ever want your vote.
There is no god; get over it already! Never exchange a walk on part in the war, for a lead role in a cage.
While I haven't read my phone all that carefully lately, I seem to recall that we (Americans) were paying a little extra each month so that the phone companies could provide internet access to rural areas. And, if memory serves, this charge started back in the '90s. That we still have piss poor internet access in rural areas after about 20 years of the phone companies collecting this extra charge is nothing of criminal.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Will the US ISPs allow open wifi with ANYONE downloading copyrighted Movies, Music and Books, or will they shut them down with 3, 6 strikes?
Country fuck you taxing me for this. If I cant afford something I just cant afford it.
You want me to pay fot the damn kids electric too you know you need that for internet to work also.
Fuck this shit. Now you know why you need to grow up and get a fucking job.
What makes you think --churches-- of all places would be ok with serving as centers for learning?
Repurpose the post office. Make it their mission to provide communication, in whatever form is predominate, retiring, or emerging. For the 'last mile problem' have them partner with the USDA for further direct partnership investment. As with the last era of the post office tier the service. Mesh networking for anyone, anywhere with repeaters/access point nodes on every mailbox. Charge a premium for more preferred, direct, and "bulky" service. As a mailbox "owner" or "maintainer", the use of the the post office repeater is subject to providing the nominal, necessary electrical power to the device.
If only the FCC had the forthought to have the telecos to charge a small monthly fee to pay for the expansion of broadband networks in underserved/rural areas.
I bet they could have raised several billion dollars.
There is also no way that the telecos would just take that money and not extend and improve their networks.
It is unpossible I tell you.
"Over 20 Million (pages) served!"
THINK! It's patriotic
A number of suburban libraries have complained that parents tell their kids to hang out there until the parents get home from work. Sometimes the kids get bored and feisty and the libraries dont like it.
Nothing to see here.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"