[thriftwy]

My issue here is that screen content today often of very low quality.

It's even worse than TV was 25 years ago (actual TV became worse too during that period).

Even what I'm having on my screen, non-work-related, is information equivalent of trash food.

I now have doubts whether I am comfortable in letting my kid on this crapfest. Case in point: games that have no gameplay, no difficulty, no plot, no information, and exist solely to make spend money via in-app purchases. This of course lets them kill off everything else on market by putting half of that money into advertising.

[cmiles74]

I agree that there's a lot of crap out there, but I'm not entirely sure that the crap to not-crap ratio is larger than it has always been. I remember saving up dimes and quarters to buy discounted Atari 2600 cartridges only to find re-hashed versions of games that I already had played. Television, in particular, I remember as being pretty terrible and repetitive. That it's so much easier to get at the stuff, that seems like the biggest change to me.

Children aren't particularly great at ferreting out the best content, but I think that when they work together with parents (or older siblings, etc.) that are at least somewhat interested then they can find some real gems. The Toca Boca games (so far) have lacked in-app purchases and can be a lot of fun. There's some really good content out on Amazon and Netflix, I find that if I spend a little time working with my child every so often, we find some really fun stuff.

[cableshaft]

There's still plenty of really excellent tv and games out there, there's just also a lot more crap too.

[thriftwy]

It seems that I am unable to navigate the offerings.

There used to be forums, there used to be communities, there used to be journals if it comes to that. Now it's nothing of that. It's awful tops from Google Play and even awfuler advertising. I don't understand how one searches for something of value.

With TV it's easier because there's at least IMDB.

[mikestew]

It seems that I am unable to navigate the offerings.

I don't navigate them at all. I hear about shows from coworkers, or occasionally trip across something right here on HN. As a recent example, I present The Orville. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15333242) I mean, I'd heard of it, but it didn't sound like it was for me. As the thread shows, I was wrong. Now my wife and I are hooked. Or sometimes a show will just get mentioned in passing here, I'll look it up, watch an episode to find out if we'll like it. Once in a great while Netflix or iTunes will come up with something "you might like, mikestew!" that's worth watching. Not very often, though.

That's it, we just watch what I've tripped across serendipitously. And we can't keep up (just now getting to the third season of 12 Monkeys). Granted, our viewing habits might not match most (if there's nothing on, then we do something else). But if we want to sit down and watch something, we rarely lack for something of quality.

Contrast that with the "25 years ago" you use as a comparison. My memory of TV in the 90s was using the TV set to watch movies and ST:NG. I don't think we watched much, if any, actual TV shows because I recall that there was nothing worth watching except ST:NG.

Games are the same for me, whatever my circle mentions, and whatever Bethesda has put out recently. That might or might not work for others, especially if you don't like RPGs like Bethesda puts out. I've tried paying attention to IGN and the like, but, yeah...

That's not to argue that it isn't a crapfest out there. It's partially why I quit paying attention. Let's take Modern Family as an example. Seems to get rave reviews, it's been on for a while. Hmm, might be decent. I didn't even know that shows still did laugh tracks. And the jokes were recycled versions of what was on TV 40 years ago in the 70s. Drop an episode in a time machine to 1978, and the only difference viewers would notice are those strange glass hand-held devices the characters keep staring at, and wow, their microwave sure is small.

[thriftwy]

With shows it's easier. With apps it's harder because it's now what usually gets discussed and tastes vary a great deal.

[mi100hael]

There are still forums, communities, and journals. They just aren't on the Play store.

[thriftwy]

You are missing my point. There's no longer an obvious source of information about what information is not a waste of time.