[taeric]

While I get what you are saying, claiming it has never been easier is somewhat silly. It was never required in the past. So, as easy as it may be now, it is still harder than many times before.

Worse, as well intentioned and correct as your advice is, you are still many zero days from a hosed machine. Sure, you don't let them download arbitrary apps. Doesn't matter if they visit some sites.

[wvenable]

When I was kid in the 80's and 90's, I had unfettered access to my computer. I had video game systems. I had portable video games systems. I ran an adult BBS when I was 13.

There was no controls at all in those times. You still had the option to give your kid a device or not -- same as now. And you can connect that to the Internet or not -- same as now. But now you can actually have much more fine-grained control -- it doesn't have to be all or nothing. But you still have to decide and I don't see why Apple needs to make all the decisions when I have the controls.

> You are still many zero days from a hosed machine.

It's definitely not as easy as you make it sound -- the sky isn't falling that fast or we'd all be screwed. And I block web sites as well.

[taeric]

I was a kid in the same times. Yes, for those of us lucky enough to have access to machines that had good modems (or, well, any modem), some semblance of this was possible. To argue it is at all at the same scale, though, is rather wrong.

The comparison was "it has never been easier." Back then, just don't buy that rather expensive modem and let the kid take up the home phone. Nowadays, it is "don't buy the entry level game system or ubiquitous computing device."

It really is vastly harder nowadays, because of how ubiquitous networked devices are. Can it feel easier? Sure, but I guarantee that most motivated kids can and will outsmart most parental controls used by less than tech savvy parents.

[Fnoord]

> I had video game systems. I had portable video games systems.

> There was no controls at all in those times.

There was though; you could by design do less with it than a Raspberry Pi with Internet connection.

Its like using vi versus emacs. Neither is better, each have their pros and cons. These (portable) video games systems are akin to vi; they do one specific job really well.