China floats strict screentime limits and content crimps for kids
- Reference: 1691040489
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/08/03/china_kids_internet_restrictions_plan/
- Source link:
The plan, [1]outlined on Tuesday by the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission, proposes that devices used by kids – including smartphones, tablet computers, smart watches and other wearables – include a "minor mode" that parents can enable.
Minor mode will have different settings depending on a child's age, with rules changing when kids turn 8, 12, and 16.
[2]
Kids aged under eight will only be allowed 40 minutes of usage each day, increasing to an hour for those aged between nine and 16. Seventeen-year-olds get two whole hours a day.
[3]
[4]
Exemptions are possible if parents specify apps that kids are allowed to use beyond their daily time limits.
[5]Beijing lists the stuff it wants generative AI to censor
[6]China bans deepfakes created without permission or for evil
[7]Always read the comments: Beijing requires oversight of all reader-generated chat
[8]China demands internet companies create governance system for algorithms
Content served to kids would be limited by age under the plan, and content providers be required to provide content appropriate for viewing in minor mode – and make it easy to find on their services.
Kids under three years of age will get age-appropriate songs and other material, with a recommendation to offer audio content. Between the ages of four and eight, kids will get to see more general educational material. Upon turning nine, content covering popular science, life skills, and age-appropriate news will become available.
Thirteen-year-olds get to view "entertaining content with positive guiding significance," and 17-year-olds graduate to "recommend information that is suitable for the cognitive ability of this age group and healthy."
[9]
The touted minor mode would also:
Prevent use of a device between 22:00 and 06:00;
Remind users to take a break every 30 minutes;
Allow parents to set device usage times;
Include anti-bypass measures – such as only allowing factory resets with parental permission, and;
Require the minor mode app to be present on a device's home page at all times, without the ability to hide or uninstall it.
The plan also calls for all content viewed by kids to reflect Socialist values, and to be free of material that could negatively impact physical or mental health.
Another requirement is for developer mode to be accessible only if parents permit it – whoever wrote this thing has clearly thought about the issues in detail.
The plan is a draft for comment. But in Xi Jinping's China, such drafts often advance to regulation with little change.
+COMMENT
If adopted, this plan will give tech and content ecosystems enormous to-do lists.
The likes of Apple and Google, for example, would have plenty of work to do to ensure their operating systems and online stores can comply with the sweeping regulations – as would China's constellation of app stores. Content producers would have to run teams dedicated to age-appropriate content.
But parents in China, and beyond, may not mind the burden imposed on tech and content companies.
[10]
Like many parents, your correspondent investigated content filters and router-level controls to weed out online content that wasn't appropriate for my kids to access. All were scarcely usable and/or so disruptive to domestic internet operations that they were not worth the time to make them behave.
We muddled through, and so did our now-young-adult children – despite a few unsavoury online incidents along the way. Plenty of our parental peers told us of their children suffering more, or worse, online experiences.
China's ecosystem-level approach reflects the Middle Kingdom's rigid values, which don't echo in much of the Reg -reading world. Yet I feel sure many parents reading this article would find China's approach appealing – even as they ponder another extension to Beijing's surveillance and censorship apparatus. ®
Get our [11]Tech Resources
[1] http://www.cac.gov.cn/2023-08/02/c_1692541991073784.htm
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZMt6xRJCarbLiPg-ukvjzQAAAhc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZMt6xRJCarbLiPg-ukvjzQAAAhc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZMt6xRJCarbLiPg-ukvjzQAAAhc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/12/china_ai_regulation/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2022/12/12/china_deep_synthesis_deepfake_regulation/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/20/china_internet_comment_censorship_policy/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2021/09/30/china_to_regulate_algorithms/
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZMt6xRJCarbLiPg-ukvjzQAAAhc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZMt6xRJCarbLiPg-ukvjzQAAAhc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: "parents everywhere might just welcome the Communist approach"
The other parents would like the screen time limit for those kids as well... I have a feeling that those "cellphone babysitter kids" have a weird attention span, are more... hyperactive (or whatever you would call that), among some weird social behaviour, because how would you learn that without interacting with other humans. Plus this screen time limit would basically instantly close at least some of the gap in reading and listening comprehension that all lament about. Seriously, those kids are lagging their classmates as they enter school already, and no program will close that gap. Ever. They also tend to be less interested in things, they tend to have stopped asking "why this?" "why that?" early on, because apparently nobody bothered to try to answer those questions, and being curious is discouraged. Which is a shame, and not the kids' fault (and thus a subject that triggers me - c'mon, don't neglect your kids!).
I'm not sure about the two hours for 17-year-olds, I know I was gaming and programming more than that. The other numbers I can see, from my own experience with my (and other people's) kids. After exceeding the time allotment they tend to start behaving really.... weird (and not in a good way). I cannot recall how much TV we were allowed to watch as kids, there was a (similar?) limit.
Re: "parents everywhere might just welcome the Communist approach"
> I'm not sure about the two hours for 17-year-olds
Do you want to sew the seeds of a revolution? Because this is how you sew the seeds of a revolution.
Re: "parents everywhere might just welcome the Communist approach"
"raising children to be capable of occupying themselves"
Apparently that's a lost art. I haven's met lately any children capable of surviving over a minute without being actively entertained, and a simple book (even comic book) won't cut it, it takes at least bloody gladiator fights to mildly entertain them, for a couple minutes.
We're raising generations of unimaginative, absent-minded, drama-starved psychopaths. No wonder they're tethered to "social media" and readily adopt any silly conspiracy theory out there: They're junkies, they simply can't live without being fed a constant stream of drama.
Microsoft have been floating parental controls also...
...however they've been sending the notices to the e-mails of the accounts... in other words, the notices have probably gone to the kids instead of the parents. Microsoft probably don't care... box ticked from their point of view, and the regulator is probably clueless as to what's happened.
I have tried e-mailing a copy to el-reg but apparently my e-mails have been blocked, so, meh.
"We're raising generations of unimaginative, absent-minded, drama-starved psychopaths."
The return of dumb phones? Teens ditch easy internet access for mental health [May, 2023] Is dumb the new smart? Young people are starting to ditch their smartphones as they look for new ways to unplug. Spurred by a desire to "digital detox," there's a growing movement among Generation Z to do away with smartphones and revert back to "dumb phones" like old-school flip or slide phones.
"parents everywhere might just welcome the Communist approach"
I seriously doubt that because apparently parents everywhere are quite happy foisting screens into the hands of their sprogs in order to keep them quiet.
Limiting children's screen time would apparently mean taking up parents' time occupying said children and we can't have that, now can we ?
Of course, there would be the option of raising children to be capable of occupying themselves, but that's silly talk these days.