DadTalk

Virtual Worlds for Kids to Flood the Market

Shhhh. I need your help keeping a secret from my children. Don’t tell them about Webkinz or Club Penguin. Ever.

I’m especially talking to you, gift-givers. I will be checking all, cuddly, stuffed animals for  “Webkinz” tags. If I find one, be prepared to cough up a gift receipt pronto.

To be honest, I didn’t even know what Webkinz was until about two weeks ago. But at a recent holiday party, a boy about Seth’s age was dragging one around by the ear. The 4-year-old freaked whenever he lost sight of the toy.

The boy’s dad explained the concept to me: You get the doll, go online and activate an account. From there, you can feed and take care of your Beagle, Alley Cat or Brown Arabian. Personally, I’d go for the Bull Frog, since cats and dogs dominate the market. Besides, it would be a lot cooler to feed it insects than stinky dog food.

So you are probably wondering, what’s wrong with these virtual worlds? Harmless fun, right?

Will Tribune Sale Decision Arrive on April Fool’s Day?** Oops, It Came a Day Later

It’s ironic that the sale of the Tribune Company may be decided sometime today – the ultimate April Fool’s joke. Even if the sale is completed today, tomorrow or next week, it may be months or years before we discover who the actual Fool is.

Will it be billionaires Eli Broad and Ron Burkle for thinking the Chicago-myopic management team would actually consider two Angelinos over a home-town favorite? Is it Sam Zell, who is investing at least $300 million of his own cash to buy into a declining industry? Is it for all them for thinking they have a clue about running a complex media company? If I hear it’s just like any business one more time, I’m going to scream…

Are the fools the folks willing to help the billionaires in their highly-leveraged buyout scheme? And who are these people, anyway? Do they read newspapers?

Or maybe the fools are the Chandlers and other directors who are forcing the sale of Tribune in the first place. After all, newspapers historically struggle financially whenever the economy is doing its best. That’s because advertisers feel confidant they don’t need to feed the local monopoly anymore.

But if my sometimes faulty memory is correct, the newspaper industry experienced a similar slump in the late 1980s just as the housing market climaxed. Then – as car dealers tried to unload luxury cars, grocery stores fought for every customer, and furniture stores were desperate to unload overcrowded showrooms – newspaper advertising jumped.

Consumers bought more newspapers as the economy worsened, hungry for help wanted sections and news on the economy. The question becomes, will Internet sites such as Craig’s List and Monster.com continue to siphon off ads and readers when the economy sinks into the abyss? Or will local businesses begin to realize that a large number of Americans don’t regularly use computers?

Regardless of who turns out to be the fool, the end-losers will be Tribune employees, especially if they’re forced into an Employee Stock Ownership Program. If you don’t remember what happened to United Airline employees, just read this story in The Chicago Tribune. Think of this whole business as a sub-prime loan for the newspaper industry.

Even if not forced into an ESOP, any sale of the company will require such enormous debt that employees will be saddled with a management desperate to increase revenues at any cost to pay down interest much less principal. Increased revenues would be the preferred way to pay down this extra burden, but more likely, management will continue to cut costs. And more of my industry friends will suffer because of Fools who don’t know how to manage the newspaper industry.

**Update:
The Tribune Company is making a bid for more money from Sam Zell at the last minute, reports The Associated Press via Editor and Publisher. Either it’s a bold move or the Tribune Board will be labeled Fools for sending Sam packing. Remember, just a few months ago, the Tribune Company couldn’t find any serious takers. Here is a more detailed story in The New York Times. (I have had trouble accessing the Chicago Tribune website all day. Hmmm, coincidence?)

The Chicago Tribune announces that Sam Zell has purchased the company with an surprise caveat: If Eli Broad and Ron Burkle come up with a better offer, the company can upgrade to the better deal.

I think this paragraph in the Tribune story sums up my feelings:

Even some industry rivals are dumbfounded by what Zell has planned. "The amount of debt Tribune is going to have blows my mind," said one of them, noting that he's expecting three years of cash flow declines as once-loyal advertisers rush to get online.

Later tonight I will post my tips, suggestions and warnings for Sam.

Taxes, ‘Modern Conveniences’ Chip Away at Parenting Time

I love TurboTax. I never used it before getting married, but as my taxes became increasingly complex, the program proved to be a huge timesaver.

But even as the program has improved, I’ve had to spend more and more time doing taxes. Itemizing deductions gets increasingly confusing each year. And now that my wife is freelancing more, I have the added complication of a home business.

At least taxes come around only once a year. Our supposedly super-efficient society keeps taking more and more time away from parenting. Here are some examples:

Health care – My PPO was sending me hundreds of Explanation of Benefits forms each year. I finally got this under control by creating a web account.

But when I look online, I have no idea what Blue Cross is doing. There are hundreds of bills in there, some paid, some not. I’m going to have to spend some quality time on hold somewhere in India to find out WTF they’re doing.

Flexible spending accounts – If you don’t know what these are, consider yourself lucky. Basically, these accounts withhold money from your paycheck so you pay less in income taxes.

You get the money back by faxing your health care or child care expenses to a vendor chosen by your workplace. (The accounts are separate.)

But you have to store tons of paperwork – those Explanation of Benefit forms mentioned above and receipts – to get your money back. We have piles of the junk in our office. Currently, I’m spending hours on the phone with the vendor that administers the program because they won’t send me my money.

At least this year my workplace went with a different vendor and a seemingly more efficient process.

Bills – I still do these the old-fashioned way, because as much as I love technology, it’s not safe. If you have any doubt, read this fantastic story on spyware in The Washington Post.

Considering some of my personal data was recently hacked from a company I didn’t even know existed, I’m sticking to paper and shredder for now.

Shopping – Americans buy more than ever. Sure, you can simplify your life to some degree, but we face choices our parents never did and the selections are much greater and more confusing. We also investigate our purchases via the Internet and Consumer Reports more carefully than previous generations.

Consider items, some mandatory, we have to buy today: Car seats, computers, routers, high-speed Internet access, digital cameras, iPods, cable service, cell phones, Voice Over IP phone service, automobiles and even yard service. For the records, we don’t have an iPod or Voice over IP. We also don’t get cable or yard service, because they’re too expensive.

Technology – Computers are my favorite tool, period. But let’s face it, they eat up a huge chunk of the day when you consider how much time we spend surfing or reading blogs. I try to do all my computer work at home when the kids are still asleep, but sometimes I’m less successful than others.

There are plenty other distractions, which seem to cut deeply into each day. What are some of your favorite modern time-wasters or annoyances? In the meantime, I need to get back to doing taxes.

Google Finally Offers Blog Search Engine

Blog search engines have always been frustrating. Well, the battle to find just the blog or entry you’re looking for just became a little easier with Google’s Blog Search beta.

The search engine primarily brings up individual posts. If several blogs meet the criteria, a list of likely blogs appears at the top. Limiting searches to individual posts will help readers because Google currently find words spread throughout my site, which results in false hits.

How do you make sure your site shows up in the Google blog search? Well, the good news is you don’t have to be on Blogger. According to Google’s About section, you just need to make sure you are publishing an RSS or Atom feed.

A quick check reveals that all three of my family’s blogs, Dadtalk, Inlandempress and Bookbuds are already listed. For those sites that don’t show up, Google promises a manual signup tool soon.

One drawback though – the new blog search only contains items that have been published since Google started indexing, which is about June 2005. “We are working on ways to include older posts as well,” Google writes in its About section. If you don’t want to be published, read up after clicking this link.

I wonder though: Will blog entries continue to show up on the standard Google search? If they already done this, it would explain a drop in hits that started in late June. If they are about to do it, then I expect my hits – half of which come from Google – will drop more. Ah well.

There Are Some Video Games My Children Will Never Play

A couple days ago, blog acquaintance Renee at LAPD Wife and I were discussing a particularly nasty video game, “25 to Life.” While we’ve never played the game, the website clearly glorifies hoodlums shooting and killing police officers.

It probably comes as no surprise that the wife of a police officer would not be happy, but such games should horrify all parents who would prefer their children grow up normal and healthy.

“ ‘25 to Life’ allows players to attack police with an arsenal of guns, Molotov cocktails, broken bottles and baseball bats,” Renee writes. “When weapons fail, players can use civilians as human shields.”

Is this just clean fun for children? Is it a good message for our children? I think not.

Another video game in the news is equally violent “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.” Only in this case, it’s not the violence that has watch group Media and the Family sounding alarm bells, reports The Associated Press via San Jose Mercury News.

Instead the group is complaining about sex scenes allegedly hidden on the game’s DVD, which was “unlocked” by programmer Patrick Wildenborg. The game screen grab – caution, not work safe – revealed on the programmer’s website qualifies as pornographic.

Video-game maker Rockstar Games has yet to verify whether the sexual images were on the original DVD as Wildenborg claims, but apparently post publication games are regularly modified by freelance programmers to increase a player’s power or intensify a game’s violence. Grand Theft Auto is rated M for Mature, but had the ratings board been aware of sex scenes, the game would have been labeled AO – Adults Only.

While violent and sexualized song lyrics, TV shows and movies are a big enough problem, I find interactive video games more worrisome. After all, children who play these things are role playing – living out fantasies that may evolve into a form of reality.

When your teenager is playing these games, some young programmer – whether corporate or freelance – has unfettered access and even control of your children, many who play 24-7. Remember, with games like these, gang life is glorified, killing cops is desirable and sex is offered as the reward. Such messages may not unhinge your own child, but what about the one who lives next door?

While parents may fear being un-cool, they have every right and even the responsibility to deny their kids access to such games. Obviously, millions of parents are not willing to do this, but games like Grand Theft Auto and 25 to Life will not be a part of my children’s lives.

Electronics-loving KidsEarn Generation M Title

When I was growing up we usually had one or two TVs in the house. A black and white in my mom’s bedroom and usually a small color one downstairs. Although my cousins always had a big color console TV, my mom never felt any great need to spend a fortune on one. She also didn’t spend money on stereo equipment. Or an Atari console to play video games such as pong or asteroids. Or a computer. Or most other electronic devices that were hitting the market in the 1970s and early 1980s.

We did have a handheld game called Football from Mattel, but that’s because our grandfather, who sold toys, brought several home to us. For those not familiar with the game, it featured red LED lights that moved across a screen in a quasi-football formation. You had to get your little red guy around the other team’s red guys. I was pretty good at the game, too.

After a while, though, the game became boring so I usually went back to playing outside or reading books. All in all, I probably spent less than two hours a day on electronic devices. My, how things have changed.

American children ages 8-18 spend an average of 6.5 hours using some form of electronic media every single day of the week, reports The Washington Post. But when you include multitasking, such as listening to music while writing on the computer, kids are spending the equivalent of 8.5 hours a day, reports the Post on the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation report “Generation M: Media in the Lives of Children.” (pdf) While only 16 percent of kids multitasked in a 1999 sister study, 26 percent of children did in the new study.

What does all this media exposure mean for our children? “We are conducting an experiment on this generation of children and we have no idea what the effects will be,” New York Sen. Hilary Rodham Clinton told the press during the report’s unveiling.

Unfortunately, the study failed to establish a strong connection between media exposure and learning. The only conclusion the authors were willing to draw? That while electronic media exposure doesn’t necessarily hurt grades, those who read print material do seem to get better letter grades.

Not surprisingly, children in homes without rules enforcing media usage are developing differently than those who do. Children in homes with strict rules tend to read more books, for example. Those who use electronics the most seem the least satisfied with their lives.

Here are some other tidbits from the study:

• 68 percent of all children have a television in their room.
• 54 percent of all children have a VCR or DVD player in their room, up from 36 percent in 1999.
• 36 percent of all children have cable or satellite TV in their room, up from 29 percent.
• 63 percent of families eat meals with the TV on.
• 51 percent of American homes leave the TV on even when no one is watching.
• 53 percent of children grades 7-12 report no family rules about watching TV.
• 46 percent of children report rules on watching TV, but only 20 percent say those rules are regularly enforced.
• 83 percent of American kids own a video game console. 21 percent report rules governing playing time.
• 86 percent of kids have a computer in their home. Only 28 percent report rules about how much time they can spend on it.

Not surprisingly, wealthier families tend to have more media tools at home than poorer ones. While it’s pretty clear that exposure to television is bad news for infants and toddlers, no one really knows what the long-term impact will be on children over 8. Without a closer examination as to what media is used by a child and how it impacts learning and thought processes, this is pretty much an open-ended experiment on our children that will continue to evolve over the next couple generations. In the meantime, my wife and I plan to keep strict control over our son’s media exposure.

Additional:

• Here’s More Evidence TV Ads Bad for Kids
• TV Commercialism Harms Children, Like It or Not

(Thanks go to Mark Sicignano at Families and Technology for alerting me to the new Kaiser report.)