Some of the things my wife and I have provided for my kids:
- lots of bookcases with probably >1500 books (including lots of kids/picture books) - what we've collected over the years
- a family laptop (2012 MacBook Pro) with no internet connection, pre-loaded with Pages, Sheets, Affinity Photo/Designer, a few small games, and some coding tools (Python, Ruby, VSCode, Scratch, etc.).
- Lego Spike and Spike Prime robotics learning sets (with software on an iPad, no internet)
- an upright piano (originally for me, but now they're taking lessons; I got it for $700 at a closeout sale at a piano store)
- a MIDI keyboard connected to Pianoteq running on an iPad in single-app mode with a couple of self-powered studio monitors and headphones
- an old-school landline phone connected to a VoIP box, served by UniFi Talk ($10/month).
- Each of them has their own CD player boombox, we have a large collection of CDs
- An iPad with Audible, disconnected from the internet, but with our audio book collection available (over the years, it's gotten into the hundreds of books)
- some good play equipment and a hammock in the back yard :)
these are great, thanks for sharing. ive found the tonibox for my youngest (3rd go round) really has helped deescalate tv watching and given us an alternative when they want to watch cartoons.
one question for you; any plans on what you might do when the kids are 15, in highschool and all their friends have iphones?
Ironic, the picture on this article appears to be AI generated. I thought the Sony CD player looked neat, and I'd never seen one like it before. I thought I might try to buy one on eBay, that's how cool I thought it was. But Google says "Digital fingerprints embedded within the file verify that this is an artificially generated rendering."
My eye went to the labeled floppy disk, since no floppy regularly used for more than a week ever had that pristine of a label on it, and there’s no practical reason you’d use floppy disks over flash drives or burned CDs today. (And why would you write 1998 on it?) Alas, none of us will be able to tell before too long.
It seems plausible, at least, that the floppy has such a pristine label because the kids didn’t end up using it. Even if I was a kid and into retro games I don’t think I’d care to play my parents’ saves. (Not to say I have any strong belief that this is a non-AI image).
As someone who grew up in the 90's, I think seeing the live progression of tech was really helpful for my own understanding. For instance we saw:
- CDs moving to Mp3s moving to the ipod and finally streaming
- Games moving from 8bit to early 3d graphics to where they are today
- Family computer moving to laptops and eventually to ipads
- Landlines to early cell phones to the iphone today
All of these experiences helped ground the core principals behind this technology. And the pace of these transformations (while rapid) was still something you could keep up with. Everything was built on the same principals.
But today kids go from zero to iPad + AI generated tiktoks by time they turn 2. Sure parents can try to hide the tech, but it doesn't change the fact that it's out there and available as soon as they enter school.
Maybe I'm overindexing on my childhood, but I would love to recreate some abridged history of this for my kids. I think seeing the building blocks helps build a much more healthy relationship with technology.
Most kids that grew up during the timeline you described had no interest in computer architecture. The small minority that did care is probably the same size now.
The other 99% who were into yoyo-ing back then are now into TikTok, that's all.
We recently got a landline. A few of my daughter’s friends got the “tin can phone” but it looked so poorly made and over-priced. It was easy enough to setup voip with one of those old school stretchy cabled phones.
It pretty cute watching her get excited when it rings and sweet that she gets to talk to her friends any time she likes… from the living room.
My kids (12-year-old boy, 7-year-old girl) recently got Tin Can phones, as did several of their friends, and absolutely love them.
One note: you can authorize regular phone numbers for them to be able to call, but only if you pay the subscription ($10/month I think? We didn't do this...)
I know I could build the same thing out of esp32's but it would be a big hassle, and I'd have to build one for all their friends too!
probably the -worst- thing I ever did as a kid was take my parents' (mostly ripped) collection of VHS tapes and drop them into the 80 gallon fish tank to raise the fish up so I CoUlD ToUCh the FiBsCH. ah, then i blamed my brother... yup that memory still hurts!
i soo can't wait for my karmic come-uppance with my... exceedingly large retro video game collection.
They may have been first released in 1982, but CDs are still the most high-tech widespread way to buy music. Newer technologies to buy music, like SACD and DVD-A have never had widespread support.
I have been dj’ing for ~20 years, and have a sizeable house music vinyl collection. I can’t wait for my kiddo to get into it. She’s showing interest already.
Same! ~25 years or so for me. I'm just now letting my oldest begin to manipulate the vinyl records beyond just playing them, but they've both loved slapping CDs into my CDJs and going wild with them.
Useful reframe: it's not old vs. new tech, it's tools you command vs. media that commands you. "Retro" correlates with "good for kids" mostly because old tools aren't engagement-optimized — they sit there until the kid acts. A modern non-algorithmic tool can be just as good.
What a dumbphone doesn't solve is the social tax — opting a kid out of the addictive layer can also opt them out of the group chat. That's the actually-hard part.
True - for what it's worth, I find having my own library on Jellyfin much nicer than Netflix (or god help us, youtube). Just downloading the videos you like from youtube and setting them up as Jellyfin "channels" is a much calmer experience than using YT.
>What a dumbphone doesn't solve is the social tax — opting a kid out of the addictive layer can also opt them out of the group chat. That's the actually-hard part.
It's hard to say how this'll go in the long run. I have two littler children right now, and a lot of the parents of much younger kids, at least in the area we live in, seem to be trying really hard to move in the "dumb phone/don't let them fall into these addictive layers" direction. Many of the parents we meet talk about eventually giving them dumb phones, or getting a landline at home so kids can call each other.
My hope is that with sustained effort from the community, this sort of concern falls by the wayside to a good degree. Who knows how it'll play out in the long-term given how much our culture has structured itself around this bullshit, but it's nice to see folk trying to push back in a more concerted way.
I imagine it’ll be quite socially stratified - upper-middle class parents will be giving their kids dumbphones and keeping them off social media, possibly sending them to ‘tech-free’ schools, while poorer parents won’t.
Unfortunately this seems quite plausible from today’s POV. As the old saying goes if you don’t want to be the product, you’ll have to pay for it. And I see only a silver of people being rich enough to afford and educated enough to care for paying privacy- or sanity-preserving tools and services.
We’ve dug this hole ourselves, without knowing better, over the last decade or so. Most social life / communications happens inside those platforms.
If we want our kids to thrive in the world without being hooked on this attention syphoning machines, we must get the socials out of those walled gardens.
This is a huge challenge, and no one but us will build it. It will require deliberate action in our community.
It's a massive struggle. I'm somewhat thankful that we didn't have kids until after it was apparent what the impact of this sort of ecosystem has on them, and it's refreshing to meet other parents who feel the same way. Who knows what kind of success we'll have, but it's reassuring to know that there's a push from at least some subset of parents with littles.
Yeah-- the group chat is / was the damned problem.
My daughter's sports teams, since moving up to 12U, have had group chats. She was absolutely getting left behind in the social interaction. It was painful to watch.
It's still a pain point because we've been limiting her SMS to known contacts. We're probably coming to have to capitulate on that because other parents don't seem to grok what we are trying to do and don't understand why we want to get their kids' phone numbers to add to my daughter's approved contact list. I guess we're the only people who have ever done this... >sigh<
Some of the things my wife and I have provided for my kids:
- lots of bookcases with probably >1500 books (including lots of kids/picture books) - what we've collected over the years
- a family laptop (2012 MacBook Pro) with no internet connection, pre-loaded with Pages, Sheets, Affinity Photo/Designer, a few small games, and some coding tools (Python, Ruby, VSCode, Scratch, etc.).
- Lego Spike and Spike Prime robotics learning sets (with software on an iPad, no internet)
- an upright piano (originally for me, but now they're taking lessons; I got it for $700 at a closeout sale at a piano store)
- a MIDI keyboard connected to Pianoteq running on an iPad in single-app mode with a couple of self-powered studio monitors and headphones
- an old-school landline phone connected to a VoIP box, served by UniFi Talk ($10/month).
- Each of them has their own CD player boombox, we have a large collection of CDs
- An iPad with Audible, disconnected from the internet, but with our audio book collection available (over the years, it's gotten into the hundreds of books)
- some good play equipment and a hammock in the back yard :)
I hope it has been and will be enriching to them.
these are great, thanks for sharing. ive found the tonibox for my youngest (3rd go round) really has helped deescalate tv watching and given us an alternative when they want to watch cartoons.
one question for you; any plans on what you might do when the kids are 15, in highschool and all their friends have iphones?
Ironic, the picture on this article appears to be AI generated. I thought the Sony CD player looked neat, and I'd never seen one like it before. I thought I might try to buy one on eBay, that's how cool I thought it was. But Google says "Digital fingerprints embedded within the file verify that this is an artificially generated rendering."
My eye went to the labeled floppy disk, since no floppy regularly used for more than a week ever had that pristine of a label on it, and there’s no practical reason you’d use floppy disks over flash drives or burned CDs today. (And why would you write 1998 on it?) Alas, none of us will be able to tell before too long.
It seems plausible, at least, that the floppy has such a pristine label because the kids didn’t end up using it. Even if I was a kid and into retro games I don’t think I’d care to play my parents’ saves. (Not to say I have any strong belief that this is a non-AI image).
He is a technologist as stated.
As someone who grew up in the 90's, I think seeing the live progression of tech was really helpful for my own understanding. For instance we saw:
- CDs moving to Mp3s moving to the ipod and finally streaming
- Games moving from 8bit to early 3d graphics to where they are today
- Family computer moving to laptops and eventually to ipads
- Landlines to early cell phones to the iphone today
All of these experiences helped ground the core principals behind this technology. And the pace of these transformations (while rapid) was still something you could keep up with. Everything was built on the same principals.
But today kids go from zero to iPad + AI generated tiktoks by time they turn 2. Sure parents can try to hide the tech, but it doesn't change the fact that it's out there and available as soon as they enter school.
Maybe I'm overindexing on my childhood, but I would love to recreate some abridged history of this for my kids. I think seeing the building blocks helps build a much more healthy relationship with technology.
Most kids that grew up during the timeline you described had no interest in computer architecture. The small minority that did care is probably the same size now.
The other 99% who were into yoyo-ing back then are now into TikTok, that's all.
We recently got a landline. A few of my daughter’s friends got the “tin can phone” but it looked so poorly made and over-priced. It was easy enough to setup voip with one of those old school stretchy cabled phones.
It pretty cute watching her get excited when it rings and sweet that she gets to talk to her friends any time she likes… from the living room.
My kids (12-year-old boy, 7-year-old girl) recently got Tin Can phones, as did several of their friends, and absolutely love them.
One note: you can authorize regular phone numbers for them to be able to call, but only if you pay the subscription ($10/month I think? We didn't do this...)
I know I could build the same thing out of esp32's but it would be a big hassle, and I'd have to build one for all their friends too!
It's good my man. Congrlt.
nahaha
probably the -worst- thing I ever did as a kid was take my parents' (mostly ripped) collection of VHS tapes and drop them into the 80 gallon fish tank to raise the fish up so I CoUlD ToUCh the FiBsCH. ah, then i blamed my brother... yup that memory still hurts!
i soo can't wait for my karmic come-uppance with my... exceedingly large retro video game collection.
something to be said for listening to the same cd over and over due to limited options, where you really get to know the tracks inside and out.
As the parent of an 8 yr old, I absolutely feel this.
We use CDs at home, thanks to my wife resisting getting rid of her huge collection years ago. Mine got stolen :(
They may have been first released in 1982, but CDs are still the most high-tech widespread way to buy music. Newer technologies to buy music, like SACD and DVD-A have never had widespread support.
Awesome! My kiddos love digging through my vinyl collection.
Love it!
I have been dj’ing for ~20 years, and have a sizeable house music vinyl collection. I can’t wait for my kiddo to get into it. She’s showing interest already.
Same! ~25 years or so for me. I'm just now letting my oldest begin to manipulate the vinyl records beyond just playing them, but they've both loved slapping CDs into my CDJs and going wild with them.
Useful reframe: it's not old vs. new tech, it's tools you command vs. media that commands you. "Retro" correlates with "good for kids" mostly because old tools aren't engagement-optimized — they sit there until the kid acts. A modern non-algorithmic tool can be just as good.
What a dumbphone doesn't solve is the social tax — opting a kid out of the addictive layer can also opt them out of the group chat. That's the actually-hard part.
True - for what it's worth, I find having my own library on Jellyfin much nicer than Netflix (or god help us, youtube). Just downloading the videos you like from youtube and setting them up as Jellyfin "channels" is a much calmer experience than using YT.
>What a dumbphone doesn't solve is the social tax — opting a kid out of the addictive layer can also opt them out of the group chat. That's the actually-hard part.
It's hard to say how this'll go in the long run. I have two littler children right now, and a lot of the parents of much younger kids, at least in the area we live in, seem to be trying really hard to move in the "dumb phone/don't let them fall into these addictive layers" direction. Many of the parents we meet talk about eventually giving them dumb phones, or getting a landline at home so kids can call each other.
My hope is that with sustained effort from the community, this sort of concern falls by the wayside to a good degree. Who knows how it'll play out in the long-term given how much our culture has structured itself around this bullshit, but it's nice to see folk trying to push back in a more concerted way.
I imagine it’ll be quite socially stratified - upper-middle class parents will be giving their kids dumbphones and keeping them off social media, possibly sending them to ‘tech-free’ schools, while poorer parents won’t.
Unfortunately this seems quite plausible from today’s POV. As the old saying goes if you don’t want to be the product, you’ll have to pay for it. And I see only a silver of people being rich enough to afford and educated enough to care for paying privacy- or sanity-preserving tools and services.
We’ve dug this hole ourselves, without knowing better, over the last decade or so. Most social life / communications happens inside those platforms.
If we want our kids to thrive in the world without being hooked on this attention syphoning machines, we must get the socials out of those walled gardens.
This is a huge challenge, and no one but us will build it. It will require deliberate action in our community.
It's a massive struggle. I'm somewhat thankful that we didn't have kids until after it was apparent what the impact of this sort of ecosystem has on them, and it's refreshing to meet other parents who feel the same way. Who knows what kind of success we'll have, but it's reassuring to know that there's a push from at least some subset of parents with littles.
Yeah-- the group chat is / was the damned problem.
My daughter's sports teams, since moving up to 12U, have had group chats. She was absolutely getting left behind in the social interaction. It was painful to watch.
It's still a pain point because we've been limiting her SMS to known contacts. We're probably coming to have to capitulate on that because other parents don't seem to grok what we are trying to do and don't understand why we want to get their kids' phone numbers to add to my daughter's approved contact list. I guess we're the only people who have ever done this... >sigh<