Technology

If you actually read the thing it's fine. It just requires phone manufacturers include a parental control function that is CAPABLE of those limits built in without charging extra for it. The parents still have to turn it on and can exempt apps from it or not set it up at all.

The most "authoritarian" part is online services with recommendations are "encouraged" (not actually required) to set up separate age algorithms. Algo for 3 year olds they recommend to be mostly audio and not ADHD video, algo for 8 year olds educational only, 12 year olds "positive" entertainment, 16 year olds "age appropriate". And they want app store recommendations to not advertise lootbox games at kids.

These are teenagers - if you make a law telling them not to do something, you're just making them want to do it. There's a reason why young Russian hackers are some of the best - it's a direct result of the restrictions Putin put on the Russian internet. The CCP just made the dark web cool, and I have a feeling that once this law goes into effect, we're going to see a whole generation of Chinese hackers inspired to hone their craft as a result.

Chinese kids going to be walking around with 8 smartphones like some of those people early in the Pokemon Go days. Long Huawei.

I like, but this is something parents should enforce, not the government.

I think it's such a boomer-y perspective to treat phones as toys. For a lot of people, smartphones are their main computer. People do their homework, do research, learn languages, fill out forms, and lots of other productive activities.

Even communication is not frivolous. What if someone wants to talk to their father working in a factory in distant Guangdong for their birthday?

This sounds difficult to actually implement.

For example, I play a mobile game where if you have an iOS account that is set as an “under 13” account anywhere in the settings, the in-game chat is permanently turned off for you. But, there’s nothing that stops an actual 10-year-old from having an account that doesn’t have the age settings, thusly allowing them to access whatever gets said in the game chat.

The proposals for app devs described in the article also don’t make a lot of sense and sound like huge hurdles to overcome.

While I agree with the overall positive intent, I'm very opposed to the government mandating this sort of thing.

Especially when there are a wide variety of reasons why kids might need more than that time or at odd hours to work on something. Particularly with the internet becoming more and more a facet of everyday life and just being involved in schooling as a whole.

It's like prohibition. You ban it, they're gonna find ways around it to use their phones even more. Source: I was once a teenager.

While at it make sure they don't mastrubate

Today on "what else can we come up with to marginalize young people and isolate them from their social support in one fell swoop..."

Should instead be on the device and/or carrier side of things. Allow to set limits on mobile/wifi data and screen usage on the OS level for parental controls. Should definitely not be enforced by governments, but rather easily enforceable by parents.

Misleading title. Should say “china to PROPOSE”

I thought you could edit titles here?

I think it's our duty to provide them with a utility that resets their time allotment.

I am all for it. Ban smartphones and bring back dumbphones.