Presumably you're also going to prohibit the kids from ever going to another kid's house.
When your kids are young, you should talk to the parents of their friends to make sure you're on the same wavelength so you know they're not going to let your kid do things you find very objectionable. If the other parents aren't responsible enough to care, then don't let your kids go over there. By the time your kids are old enough to go places without screening the adults they're old enough that if they happen to see an R rated movie or whatever they'll be ok.
And maintaining some sort of watch on the kid to ensure the kid doesn't go there against your orders.
If your kid is going places against your orders then you have bigger problems than myspace or satellite TV or whatever.
Now I wish there was a way for a parent to valide a myspace profile of someone under 18. If someone under 18 signs up THEN if should be required to be approved by a VERIFIED parent AND having the parent's profile linked up on myspace or something equivalent. I would support that.
The problem is how does myspace figure out if someone is under 18? Would everyone who signs up have to provide a drivers' license number and/or a credit card number? Who wants to do that? Aren't there serious privacy concerns there? And how would this system deal with a 14 year old "borrowing" her older sister's id? If older sister doesn't use myspace she'll never know, and then it's a whole lot of inconvenience and privacy issues for nothing.
If Linux is set up right, the technologically ignorant will have no problems using it. Ubuntu 7.04 has a system for proprietary codecs so if you try to play an mp3, avi, use flash, whatever, it will detect that and walk you through getting the codecs. This works better than Windows, because if Windows doesn't have the codec it might give you a number or a name which you can google and then download the codec from some shady website. Games? The technologically ignorant tend to like simple puzzle games, which you can find a ton of by going to Applications->Add New Programs->Games (which could be in a new users' guide, and even if it isn't it's not nuclear science) and then they can break their $10 a disc habit at Walmart (hardcare gamers tend to, out of necessity, not be technologically ignorant, so I'm ignoring them here). Peripherals? Many will buy a new printer, scanner, whatever, with the computer and Dell can make sure they work. If their old printer, scanner, etc doesn't work, then that's no harder to explain than saying "Your scanner doesn't have Vista drivers". Most people understand that old hardware doesn't always work with new hardware. It's also likely that the old peripherals will work with Linux. I haven't had a scanner or a printer not work, and with the new webcam drivers it's more likely that any particular webcam will work with Linux than with Vista.
Finally, if the newbie wrecks their install, Dell will, if they're smart, have the/home on a separate partition so they won't even have to back up their data before reinstalling. But they're not likely to wreck it, because they won't need anti-spyware/virus/crap installed on their computers, and Ubuntu by default has most ports closed so they won't need to mess with a firewall. I think most computer newbies would do better with Linux than with Windows if they get it set up right, but for most of them, unless they were friends of geeks, they would never get it set up. Dell now has the ability to change that, to give every computer newb a solidly built Linux PC. Hopefully they do it right.
I'll buy it for the guarantee that the hardware will work. I've built my own computer before, and researching every little part to make sure it works with Linux and then putting it all together and realizing the sound card maker or the wireless card maker or whoever must have switched chipsets since it doesn't work like that obscure website told me it is just a fucking pain in the ass. I wouldn't bother getting Windows on it "just in case" because I'll never use it and that would defeat the point of guaranteeing that I'd get Linux compatible hardware. Sure, most of their customers aren't going to buy a PC with Ubuntu instead of Vista, but some people will and I think it's good that they're offering this.
Dell could also partition the drives so the the/home is on a different partition so they can reinstall Ubuntu without erasing their data. That's how my system is set up, because every couple of months I see a different distro that I want to try and wind up installing on my main box.
I'd say that would be too complicated for the average Dell buyer, but since the grand total of people I know interested in buying a Linux box from Dell is *me* I hope they partition it that way. Not that I'll die if they don't, my last Dell had Windows on it and it's not like I couldn't repartition that.
I started reading the article, and got through XBox360, PS2, and then N64 at 3rd place. That's when I stopped reading it. There's a general concensus among my friends that the N64 controller is among the worst ever designed, and possibly is the worst. Whose idea was it to make a controller that you needed 3 hands to properly use?
I hate the N64 as well. Most of the games disabled a third of the controller (since their market was not three-handed gamers) so you just have a large chunk of controller as weight for no reason whatsoever. Even the Gamecube's tiny D-pad was better, even though it was almost too small to use since at least you can use it and it doesn't add an extra half of the controller. They should have replaced 360, PS2, and N64 on the list with the Wavebird. It's got wireless (360's plus) it's more comfortable than the Dual Shock, and it's not utterly horrendous like N64.
Well, as much as some of us would like that, I would much rather 'attempt' to reproduce once in a while, even though I know I might not have any kids. I think humans are one of a few species that actually enjoy reproducing, I can't speak for them, but it doesn't seem that cows, dogs or horses 'enjoy' each other and use reproduction as a way to make, emphasize and strengthen relationships
Sex isn't the same as reproduction, unless you count 9 months of watching your body bloat and other fun changes as sex.;-) An alternative method of reproduction doesn't mean people can't still have sex.
whether you like it or not, that only means you are an exception.
and as a slashdot-girl, you are a big exception from the very start... one cannot go into generalized conclusions based on your experience.
And it's the old "you're the exception, shut up" argument.
Sex shouldn't be about money, and the faster society gets over that concept the better things will be.
all nice, right and beautiful.. but how exactly do you propose to do that?
I don't need to propose anything, it's been a trend over the past decades in developed countries as women are earning more and more in comparison to men, so they are more independent and have less need for a boyfriend or husband to buy things for them.
and btw, in order to do that, you'll have to figure a way to convince your gender-colleagues not to sell their bodies anymore... good luck with that!
The problem isn't with women selling their bodies, it's with men buying them. That's why countries like Sweden, where the buying of sexual services is illegal, there is a lower rate of prostitution than in countries where the selling of the services is illegal. Prostitution is, for the most part, about disadvantaged and vulnerable women taken advantage of by men who buy and sell them (pimps and johns). Sometimes the gender roles are different (men can be prostitutes, women can be madams) but the prostitute always has the short stick.
such a hurried conclusion... a hateful and very insulting one too... with this kind of attitude, are you still expecting respect from the ppl around you?
I jumped to conclusions, and if you read the further posts you'd realize that I apologized for assuming. I had thought the educational differences were due to gender differences, but turned out to be due to a large age gap and circumstances that had the daughters already moved out as independent adults before the family had enough money to put children through school. I do, however, retain the right to criticize any family for valuing their daughters and their daughters' education less than their sons and their sons' education. I just don't see how that kinda thing is justifiable.
and of course, apart from that, one also needs *a lot* of patience.
I have more patience than most people on the internet.
seems to me that you dont fit the profile of a "world changer" at all.. and a basic common-sense rule says that as long as you are not capable to provide any help, you should keep your mouth shut.. especially when it comes to criticizing others.
So I should keep my mouth shut when I see sexist idiocy because I shouldn't criticize others? That's not a very effective method of world changing.
You're confusing Ubuntu with Kunbuntu. Ubuntu comes with Gnome, not KDE, and doesnt have a K menu by default.
That's not the point. The point is that it takes more instructions to do something with a GUI than to do the same thing with a command line. If the first thing Linux n00bs learn is how to open their command line program then things work a lot easier for them, because then you can just tell them "sudo apt-get install wine" instead of saying "click on the K icon" "What?" "Oh, you have regular Ubuntu|Xubuntu|Linux Mint|Debian|whatever. Click on the Applications menu, then go to... " and then going through all the steps, assuming you have memorized all the steps for their interface (it's easy to remember "sudo apt-get install" but I couldn't walk you through the gui steps without a Ubuntu box in front of me). I know people have their phobias of text, but it's really very vital for Linux users to know, at least if they want to get help from anyone else.
Sex shouldn't be about money, but that's what it boils down to all too often. Would most girls rather be with a guy who has money than who doesn't? Wouldn't you? I know it's kinda a crass overgeneralisation, but it's fairly true.
I can't speak for most women (because there's about 3.5 billion women out there and I don't know most of them - but neither do you) but I've never made decisions about who I will date based on the money he makes. My husband is a school bus mechanic, and my only issue with that is it's dangerous and I worry about him. Girls shouldn't be raised with the idea that a man will support them when they grow up, because too often that doesn't happen. Women need to be just as independent as men.
As for your wife's family... I'm sorry if I made assumptions, but it sounds like her brothers are getting more of an education than her and her sister have/are getting. If that's the case, then that's plain unfair (if it's not, then I'm sorry for jumping to conclusions). Is there any reason why the two oldest can't be in school with the youngest working until the older can send them to school? Is that how it would be if the boys were older and the girls were younger?
If you'd have a girlfriend, you know that you have to pay.
Bullshit. I've spent more on boyfriends than they have me. Sex shouldn't be about money, and the faster society gets over that concept the better things will be.
Anyways, your wife's family sucks. The girls have to get crap jobs, but the boys get to go to school? And the girls have to send money home to pay for their schooling when they can barely make by themselves? Maybe if the people there found it just as important to send the girls to school as the boys there would be less prostitution.
I personally look forward to the day, when I can get *any* movie or TV series episode for one-time (or one-day or whatever) viewing for a few euros, legally. I'm also looking forward for the day when I can get *any* piece of music playing once for a few cents, preferably with heuristic music selection service ("people who liked the songs you listen also liked these songs, add to your playlist?").
You want to pay for you music every time you listen to it? Why don't you just get a service like Rhapsody where you pay a monthly fee to have access to all their songs?
As for TV shows, I don't know how it is in Europe, but in America, you can buy most TV shows for a couple dollars, if that. DVD sets cost between $30 and $45 for 13 to 25 episodes, iTunes sells episodes for $2, and most TV channels even stream their episodes from their website for free (though ad-supported). If you really hate owning things, you can delete it from iTunes after watching it or give the DVD set to a library. I don't think it would be a plus to have it delete itself automatically, but still charge the same price, and I can't believe it's that much more expensive to get TV shows in Europe so that would seem like a deal there.
Grey's Anatomy is already free on the internet, sponsored by ads. Internet TV is either going to be ad-supported, or cost $2 on iTunes. It's not going to be very expensive, because otherwise you'll drive people to pirate sites (if they aren't already there).
The gameplay is great, but they should get a creative, unique storyline that shakes things up. Have a game start out like any other Zelda, but then Link, in his over-enthusiastic 11-year old hero way, does something stupidly heroic that doesn't work and he gets killed. The rest of the game you play as Zelda (same basic gameplay, but different skills) with a much darker tone to the storyline. If done right it would be bigger to gamers than when Aeris died.
And if not, Nintendo can release OoT with wiimote controls and make back their money.
Would a person who buys a Dell and uses autorun really know a lot of software designed only for Red Hat?
Ubuntu's repositories have so many programs that a newb to linux will be fine using those until they want to get technical enough to figure out alien or compiling from scratch. When I was a Ubuntu newb one of the things I really liked was that program installation is really easy. Even now I rarely use a program that isn't in the repos, so I don't think anyone new Dell recruits is going to have problems.
Broadcom wireless won't work out of the box with Ubuntu. Try Linux Mint, a distro based off Ubuntu that includes ndiswrapper and a number of windows wireless drivers already set up, and a straightforward gui for ndiswrapper if you it doesn't have the driver. Doesn't work with every card, but try it with yours.
I leave a very simple (requires no wall power) phone plugged into the land line, which is not activated, for exactly this purpose. I use my cell exclusively (work pays the bill) and if I need 911 and the cell is unusable I can go to the regular phone.
Are you sure you can get 911 on your landline? Sometimes they do completely disconnect lines that aren't activated. I moved into an apartment once where the tenant before me didn't have the phone activated. I signed up for service... and it didn't work. Turns out the box was rewired so "my" line was actually going into my neighbor's apartment (which the previous tenant had never noticed, since he didn't use landline). The phones in my apartment weren't going anywhere, 911 or not.
Even if you live in a house so that specific problem isn't going to happen, if for some reason your phone service dies (lines accidentally break or disconnect from weather, etc) you're never going to know, until you try to call 911. Don't rely on a phone without a dial tone. Either plan to go to a neighbor, or get the cheapest plan the phone company offers.
My answering machine cost like $10. And I pay that once.
Answering machines don't have all the features of voice mail. Voice mail answers your calls when you're on the phone, and you can check your voice mail from a different phone.
But for another "feature", I'd be very surprised if international calling was anywhere near on a mobile (but then I pay roughly $7 a month for mobile, and so pay a lot per. minute for "local" calls).
If you get a normal plan, international is even cheaper on mobile than landline. My husband often makes calls to Puerto Rico (from Ohio), and it's the same as a local call (deducted from minutes, nights and weekends free). Other countries have per-minute rates (Europe is about 35), but it's cheaper than landline international plans.
Also I have to wonder... wtf. are you doing for DSL, I need a phone line for that. I guess some people only have the option of Cable, or maybe have some better options.
Some people use cable or satellite (some people prefer cable or satellite), and others (like me) get DSL with no features on the phone line (no voice mail, no caller id, no long distance) so it costs all of about $15, and use the cell with all its features as their main line. My husband and I spend about $70 a month for two phones (with of course caller id, voice mail, and a "local" calling area that includes the whole country and beyond) with more minutes than we'll ever use, while my mother spends about $70 a month on her landline (not counting her DSL) with the same features except for only the one line and she can't take it with her like we can our cells (though she's retired and never leaves her house alone so it doesn't matter). I guess it depends on how use your phone and what you like, but a cell can easily be more cost-effective than a landline.
2) It's not just shitty wrestling games. Valkyrie Profile and other games take forever to load too.
4) It depends on what you think is good. Going with Metacritic.com as a metric, there's over a 100 games with a score of 80 or above (I'm counting GBA, since the DS plays GBA games) while the PSP has 46, and at least one of those is a movie.
5) Yeah, spending $10 or $20 for a stupid case isn't annoying at all.
6) FINALLY. It was almost twice as much as the DS for the longest time. ($250 vs $130)
7) Maybe it would be more helpful if Sony wasn't constantly fighting it?
9) Not everyone thinks graphics are the best part of a game. If one system has the games they like they'll buy that over the system with the prettier graphics.
The GBA is dying *now*, but the DS was released in 2004, and the GBA saw fairly solid releases for 2 years after that. Usually, when a console replaces another the older console has maybe 1 solid Christmas season, and that's the end of any decent releases. Has any decent game come out for the Gamecube since Wii came out (besides Zelda, which was for both)? The DS *was not* a successor to the GBA.
Food labels are objective. Media labels are subjective. Why should the government categorize different media based on opinions? I realize you just want them to define it, but why should the government do that instead of anyone else? Couldn't the companies or anyone else define a ratings system just as easily? The big problem with the government getting involved is freedom of speech issues. If the government rates media and decides who can and cannot see that media, they are restricting speech and they can't do that, but if they're just defining the rating system without rating or enforcing then what's the point? The rating systems that they have now aren't perfect, but they're easy enough to figure out and it's not worth trampling over freedom of speech on the hopes the government can do better.
Actually, no. Attack the consumers with a vengeance. Which consumers am I referring to? The parents who buy GTA San Andreas for their 10 year old son.
What if the parents believe the kid is mature enough to understand the difference between GTA and real life? Not saying I agree with that when it comes to a 10 year old, but if you do that for GTA you have to do that for all M rated games, and all M rated games are not the same. Dead or Alive Beach Volleyball is girls playing volleyball (some of their swimsuits are kinda skanky, but not most of them. And there's gambling. And a creepy guy giving them gifts. But still). In a good environment, I don't believe that game could hurt a kid of any age. Would you attack me for playing that game or something similar with my kids when I have them?
Parents are responsible but its not just solely them children are also raised by their environment. Unless your children are isolated from their society in a 'cave' they are also being raised by the society they live in (which includes their peers.)
WE NEED A REAL RATING SYSTEM so parents can realistically exercise their parental rights.I should be able to set my TV, computer, and consoles with detailed instructions on exactly what I will allow shown. I don't care who applies ratings but I do think federal government is needed to define and require a smarter ratings scale.
Why do you need the government to do that? There's detailed reviews of most mainstream media, so you can figure out what's appropriate for your kids before buying it for them. If they're old enough/independent enough/rebellious enough to buy the game and play it in your living room without you noticing, then what else are they doing without you noticing? Probably things a lot worse than playing videogames. Go watch your kids. TV you might say is an issue since it's broadcast live into your house, but between TV on DVD, Tivo, and other media, your kids won't be traumatized without live TV. Computers? If you're posting on slashdot you should be able to figure out something, and if your kids get around that they're probably learning more than they're finding hardcore evil stuff. If you're really paranoid, disconnect from the internet. I know one family that didn't get internet access until their youngest was 16. The government can't tell you what's appropriate for your kids. You have to decide.
We don't know most the junk on our food labels but if we have to avoid something we look for it by name on the label.
Until the government imposed a labeling system on food we didn't really have one and it would have totally sucked if the industry was pushed into defining it, taking a never ending string of lawsuits to get each ingredient listed after it hurt some group of people.
Media is different from food. Media is not a set of ingredients mixed in a bowl. If you eat a cookie, you're probably not going to be able to taste minor amounts of peanut in it, but if you watch a movie, you can hear if they use the word 'fuck'. Peanuts can also kill people, but hearing 'fuck' won't hurt any adult, and there's not even a consensus among parents that it even hurts kids. Also, while you can list profanity used, what about other situations in the game/movie/whatever that a parent might view as more inappropriate for their child? A literal "ingredients" list of a movie/game/whatever would be a play by play of every scene in it, so what would be more effective than trying to print that out on the box is for parents to either watch it/play it/whatever, or for them to get together with other parents on the internet or wherever and tell each other what in it (which they do). So what is government intervention needed for?
Slashdot Mirror
If your kid is going places against your orders then you have bigger problems than myspace or satellite TV or whatever.
If Linux is set up right, the technologically ignorant will have no problems using it. Ubuntu 7.04 has a system for proprietary codecs so if you try to play an mp3, avi, use flash, whatever, it will detect that and walk you through getting the codecs. This works better than Windows, because if Windows doesn't have the codec it might give you a number or a name which you can google and then download the codec from some shady website. Games? The technologically ignorant tend to like simple puzzle games, which you can find a ton of by going to Applications->Add New Programs->Games (which could be in a new users' guide, and even if it isn't it's not nuclear science) and then they can break their $10 a disc habit at Walmart (hardcare gamers tend to, out of necessity, not be technologically ignorant, so I'm ignoring them here). Peripherals? Many will buy a new printer, scanner, whatever, with the computer and Dell can make sure they work. If their old printer, scanner, etc doesn't work, then that's no harder to explain than saying "Your scanner doesn't have Vista drivers". Most people understand that old hardware doesn't always work with new hardware. It's also likely that the old peripherals will work with Linux. I haven't had a scanner or a printer not work, and with the new webcam drivers it's more likely that any particular webcam will work with Linux than with Vista.
/home on a separate partition so they won't even have to back up their data before reinstalling. But they're not likely to wreck it, because they won't need anti-spyware/virus/crap installed on their computers, and Ubuntu by default has most ports closed so they won't need to mess with a firewall. I think most computer newbies would do better with Linux than with Windows if they get it set up right, but for most of them, unless they were friends of geeks, they would never get it set up. Dell now has the ability to change that, to give every computer newb a solidly built Linux PC. Hopefully they do it right.
Finally, if the newbie wrecks their install, Dell will, if they're smart, have the
I'll buy it for the guarantee that the hardware will work. I've built my own computer before, and researching every little part to make sure it works with Linux and then putting it all together and realizing the sound card maker or the wireless card maker or whoever must have switched chipsets since it doesn't work like that obscure website told me it is just a fucking pain in the ass. I wouldn't bother getting Windows on it "just in case" because I'll never use it and that would defeat the point of guaranteeing that I'd get Linux compatible hardware. Sure, most of their customers aren't going to buy a PC with Ubuntu instead of Vista, but some people will and I think it's good that they're offering this.
Dell could also partition the drives so the the /home is on a different partition so they can reinstall Ubuntu without erasing their data. That's how my system is set up, because every couple of months I see a different distro that I want to try and wind up installing on my main box.
I'd say that would be too complicated for the average Dell buyer, but since the grand total of people I know interested in buying a Linux box from Dell is *me* I hope they partition it that way. Not that I'll die if they don't, my last Dell had Windows on it and it's not like I couldn't repartition that.
I don't need to propose anything, it's been a trend over the past decades in developed countries as women are earning more and more in comparison to men, so they are more independent and have less need for a boyfriend or husband to buy things for them.
The problem isn't with women selling their bodies, it's with men buying them. That's why countries like Sweden, where the buying of sexual services is illegal, there is a lower rate of prostitution than in countries where the selling of the services is illegal. Prostitution is, for the most part, about disadvantaged and vulnerable women taken advantage of by men who buy and sell them (pimps and johns). Sometimes the gender roles are different (men can be prostitutes, women can be madams) but the prostitute always has the short stick.
I jumped to conclusions, and if you read the further posts you'd realize that I apologized for assuming. I had thought the educational differences were due to gender differences, but turned out to be due to a large age gap and circumstances that had the daughters already moved out as independent adults before the family had enough money to put children through school. I do, however, retain the right to criticize any family for valuing their daughters and their daughters' education less than their sons and their sons' education. I just don't see how that kinda thing is justifiable.
I have more patience than most people on the internet.
So I should keep my mouth shut when I see sexist idiocy because I shouldn't criticize others? That's not a very effective method of world changing.
As for your wife's family... I'm sorry if I made assumptions, but it sounds like her brothers are getting more of an education than her and her sister have/are getting. If that's the case, then that's plain unfair (if it's not, then I'm sorry for jumping to conclusions). Is there any reason why the two oldest can't be in school with the youngest working until the older can send them to school? Is that how it would be if the boys were older and the girls were younger?
Grey's Anatomy is already free on the internet, sponsored by ads. Internet TV is either going to be ad-supported, or cost $2 on iTunes. It's not going to be very expensive, because otherwise you'll drive people to pirate sites (if they aren't already there).
The gameplay is great, but they should get a creative, unique storyline that shakes things up. Have a game start out like any other Zelda, but then Link, in his over-enthusiastic 11-year old hero way, does something stupidly heroic that doesn't work and he gets killed. The rest of the game you play as Zelda (same basic gameplay, but different skills) with a much darker tone to the storyline. If done right it would be bigger to gamers than when Aeris died.
And if not, Nintendo can release OoT with wiimote controls and make back their money.
Would a person who buys a Dell and uses autorun really know a lot of software designed only for Red Hat? Ubuntu's repositories have so many programs that a newb to linux will be fine using those until they want to get technical enough to figure out alien or compiling from scratch. When I was a Ubuntu newb one of the things I really liked was that program installation is really easy. Even now I rarely use a program that isn't in the repos, so I don't think anyone new Dell recruits is going to have problems.
Broadcom wireless won't work out of the box with Ubuntu. Try Linux Mint, a distro based off Ubuntu that includes ndiswrapper and a number of windows wireless drivers already set up, and a straightforward gui for ndiswrapper if you it doesn't have the driver. Doesn't work with every card, but try it with yours.
I think most cable companies allow you to get cable internet without cable TV. That's what we do. There's also satellite internet.
2) It's not just shitty wrestling games. Valkyrie Profile and other games take forever to load too. 4) It depends on what you think is good. Going with Metacritic.com as a metric, there's over a 100 games with a score of 80 or above (I'm counting GBA, since the DS plays GBA games) while the PSP has 46, and at least one of those is a movie. 5) Yeah, spending $10 or $20 for a stupid case isn't annoying at all. 6) FINALLY. It was almost twice as much as the DS for the longest time. ($250 vs $130) 7) Maybe it would be more helpful if Sony wasn't constantly fighting it? 9) Not everyone thinks graphics are the best part of a game. If one system has the games they like they'll buy that over the system with the prettier graphics.
The GBA is dying *now*, but the DS was released in 2004, and the GBA saw fairly solid releases for 2 years after that. Usually, when a console replaces another the older console has maybe 1 solid Christmas season, and that's the end of any decent releases. Has any decent game come out for the Gamecube since Wii came out (besides Zelda, which was for both)? The DS *was not* a successor to the GBA.
Food labels are objective. Media labels are subjective. Why should the government categorize different media based on opinions? I realize you just want them to define it, but why should the government do that instead of anyone else? Couldn't the companies or anyone else define a ratings system just as easily? The big problem with the government getting involved is freedom of speech issues. If the government rates media and decides who can and cannot see that media, they are restricting speech and they can't do that, but if they're just defining the rating system without rating or enforcing then what's the point? The rating systems that they have now aren't perfect, but they're easy enough to figure out and it's not worth trampling over freedom of speech on the hopes the government can do better.
Why do you need the government to do that? There's detailed reviews of most mainstream media, so you can figure out what's appropriate for your kids before buying it for them. If they're old enough/independent enough/rebellious enough to buy the game and play it in your living room without you noticing, then what else are they doing without you noticing? Probably things a lot worse than playing videogames. Go watch your kids. TV you might say is an issue since it's broadcast live into your house, but between TV on DVD, Tivo, and other media, your kids won't be traumatized without live TV. Computers? If you're posting on slashdot you should be able to figure out something, and if your kids get around that they're probably learning more than they're finding hardcore evil stuff. If you're really paranoid, disconnect from the internet. I know one family that didn't get internet access until their youngest was 16. The government can't tell you what's appropriate for your kids. You have to decide.
Media is different from food. Media is not a set of ingredients mixed in a bowl. If you eat a cookie, you're probably not going to be able to taste minor amounts of peanut in it, but if you watch a movie, you can hear if they use the word 'fuck'. Peanuts can also kill people, but hearing 'fuck' won't hurt any adult, and there's not even a consensus among parents that it even hurts kids. Also, while you can list profanity used, what about other situations in the game/movie/whatever that a parent might view as more inappropriate for their child? A literal "ingredients" list of a movie/game/whatever would be a play by play of every scene in it, so what would be more effective than trying to print that out on the box is for parents to either watch it/play it/whatever, or for them to get together with other parents on the internet or wherever and tell each other what in it (which they do). So what is government intervention needed for?