[ObsoleteNerd]

Yeh we don't allow YouTube in our house, but instead use youtube-dl to scrape relevant educational/quality videos (Lah Lah, old Play School episodes, Peppa Pig, etc) to a local folder on the NAS. She gets to "watch youtube", but we get to control what's there.

YouTube is 100% not kid friendly in any way at all, not even with their parenting controls or their kids app. It should very much be seen as an adult platform with what gets pushed through there these days.

[lion0]

How do you find new content? Without the recommendations engine of YouTube that is?

[lamlam]

If kids are known for one thing, it's their ability to watch and re-watch the same piece of content over and over. We have decades of good, high quality, children's media. Why do they need the latest and untested greatest?

[DanieI]

I credit some of my unpopularity in elementary school with growing up without cable television. All of the other children would watch Nickelodeon after school and the prizes on Legend Of The Hidden Temple would instruct them to ask their moms to buy them Jansport backpacks and AirWalk sneakers. I wasn't able to discuss yesterday's episode and didn't know how to dress to fit in.

[NeedMoreTea]

As I discovered watching our kids go through school, if you had cable and the "in backpack", kids at school would almost certainly have found something else to dig at.

Those that react get picked on. If they can't single out lack of clothes, or knowing current music, they dig at too fat, too thin, wears glasses, wrong hair colour, wrong accent, you name it. In short if you react you lose.

I am much less open to the having all the same things to fit in argument than I was when I started on the parenting journey.

[colechristensen]

Parent wasn't concerned about being picked on but not being able to participate in the culture of the other children without cable TV.

There's a big personal preference there about whether or not you want your kids (or you yourself regret being or not being) involved heavily in the mainstream pop culture of your peers as children.

Experiencing more than just whatever is popular is important, but being very isolated can have effects as well. Whatever choices you make will have a strong impact, and there are very often not clear rights and wrongs.

[NeedMoreTea]

Picked on or not able to participate is part of the same grouping that goes on in schools. For the most part is little to do with how much they are enabled or not to fit in.

Before being a parent I'd have inclined to agree with GP. The experience of seeing my kids progress, and their differing experience, through school leaves me believing it's nearly all down to personality. That of course is far harder for parents to influence. Course a kid with a sensitive disposition might well blame the lack of the right things as the reason to feel an outsider.

The one certainty is parenting ain't easy. :)

[tartoran]

So true. I will do the same for my kid when time comes, he's only 0.7yo. How about screen time, do they watch them on tablets/devices or on a media player on a TV?

[ObsoleteNerd]

I do not restrict screen time in any way. If they want to watch videos (from our scraped collection on the NAS), they can. If they want to play with the carefully chosen educational apps/games on our phones, they can. We've never restricted them since they first became interested, and it has worked out fine for us.

They barely ever watch shows or play with the phones, and most the time just want to colour in, play with Lego, or play with toys. They use the phones maybe for an hour every 3 days or so (or if we're waiting at the Doctors office or on a road trip), and watch shows maybe half an hour to an hour each day (usually in evening when they're too tired to physically play and we're preparing dinner). YMMV of course.

[Double_a_92]

> or if we're waiting at the Doctors office or on a road trip

I wonder if that robs them from the experience of ever being bored. And if that might influence them.

[ObsoleteNerd]

We regularly make sure they get experience doing nothing too. My wife and I are big believers in the importance of doing nothing, for imagination/creativity and also just because it's an important skill to have in life, to be able to sit and wait.

They're very imaginative, and we regularly find the eldest just sitting in a sunny spot in the room and "dreaming in the warm" as she calls it.

The only problem we struggle with as far as technology is that a lot of her friends already have unlimited access to TV and talk about shows she's never heard of because we don't watch (or have) TV. We purely do Netflix/Stan and YouTube, so she gets a bit upset not knowing what they're going on about, but she's starting to understand that everyone has different things they do.

[VLM]

Older, teen kids (not just my own) do seem to think they're entitled to continuous digital mental stimulation via passive consumption...

[lamlam]

>How about screen time, do they watch them on tablets/devices or on a media player on a TV?

Sorry if my comment implied I had kids, I do not. But in terms of access I see a lot of other comments further below talking about downloading everything locally and serving it through plex, which seems like a solid idea.

[ObsoleteNerd]

We just stick to the classics. Play School, Peppa Pig, The Wiggles, Lah Lah, and movies like Frozen, Happy Feet, etc. Stuff you hear about from other parents, or come across in daily life as a parent.

As mentioned in another comment, kids don't need the latest/greatest, they're perfectly happy with what they know, and you just slowly introduce stuff you want them to watch over time by adding it yourself.

[Insanity]

My nephew was at one stage really into "The minions" movie. To be honest, I can quite enjoy movies like that myself (same for the other disney / pixar bunch).

The only downside was that he for some reason really liked it if I sat next to him watching it, but I don't have the ability to rewatch them countless times :P

Still, kids definitely get hooked on stuff and stick with it through countless repititions.

[Double_a_92]

> kids don't need the latest/greatest, they're perfectly happy with what they know

I remember reading that somewhere. Young children actually prefer watching the same episode over and over again, because it's rewarding when their expectations (of what happens next) get fulfilled.

[a-saleh]

I have a 4yo daughter. We don't use youtube's recomendations to get things for her to watch, instead:

* we watch what we liked to watch when we were young (we are from Czech Republic and there is a wealth of local animation series, usually ~7 minutes/episode. If you want a sample, "Pat & Mat" is silent-duo home-improvement slapstic comedy that we kinda like :)

* we talk to other parents (i.e. you can't really escape Pepa Pig or My Little Pony - Friendship is Magic)

* we like animation, and sometimes watch even more grown-up things togehter, i.e. we liked various series from the How To Train Your Dragon universe

Three more things that I think kinda help as well:

* if she watches alone, she know she has a limit (usually 3 stories in one sitting at most?) I am really proud when she manages to close the app on her own.

* I often sit her in front of my thinkpad instead of tablet. This limits her ability to binge-watch, somewhat :P

* She has an mp3-player of sorts and a cd-player with few radio-plays. She know how to operate both of these. We don't really limit her using of the audio-only entertainment :-)

[Freak_NL]

> "Pat & Mat" is silent-duo home-improvement slapstic comedy that we kinda like :)

Did you know that Pat and Mat became a very popular export product of the Czech Republic? You might be surprised to learn that most Dutchmen know who Pat and Mat are (though not their names).

Something odd happened when it got imported into the Netherlands in the eighties: a soundtrack with spoken voices was added, and it gradually became a cult hit. Blasphemous as this may sound, the dialogue is as silly as the episodes themselves, and actually works.

The popularity of the show in the Netherlands actually helped create the demand for the new episodes made in this century.

Have a look at 'Buurman en Buurman' (neighbour and neighbour) on Youtube to see the Dutch rendition of Pat and Mat.

[a-saleh]

We have watched a few episodes of 'Buurman en Buurman' :D I was quite shocked to see they have been dubbed, but it still seems to work :)

[abalone]

I mean, that is just a different way of watching YouTube. You can restrict what they can watch right inside of the app using the “approved content only” mode.

[FabHK]

Much more selective, though, and you can choose a UI without the odious auto-play, "watch next" suggestions and (EDIT to add:) ads.