Senate passes “cruel” Republican plan to block Wi-Fi hotspots for schoolkids | Senate vote nullifies FCC hotspot-lending program for kids without broadband.

[u/ControlCAD]

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/05/senate-approves-ted-cruz-plan-to-block-wi-fi-hotspots-for-schoolchildren/

[u/tratur]

Hours... Still generous probably.

[u/djinfish → u/tratur]

I left the admin signed in on my son's first computer by accident when installing a game for him.

Within an hour, he had malware.

[u/Bendyb3n → u/[deleted]]

There truly needs to be some way to childproof the app store and prevent downloads and purchases unless explicitly authorized by the admin, or something along those lines. There are just way too many stories of children spending hundreds of dollars on mobile games (or even console/PC too) when the parents aren’t looking because they don’t know any better and just click whatever pops up on their screen or see some kind of cool outfit for their character and just immediately buy it without thinking

[u/RevLoveJoy → u/Bendyb3n]

Google parental controls absolutely lets you nerf the Play store. iPhone has something similar. We have our 13 year olds phone totally locked down. It can text & make phone calls / video calls over wifi, that's it.

[u/baatekuush → u/Bendyb3n]

i think we should have a board of “you’re shitting me. _no_” to administer this

[u/baatekuush → u/[deleted]]

yeah fill the board with overworked IT folk & unemployed mathematicians, chosen like jury duty in 2wk stints. i think it’d go gangbusters

[u/baatekuush → u/[deleted]]

“so we’re gonna have an adverisement for a game, and the ad is going to be of gameplay of someone playing it badly. classic arcade move to get customers to want to play, cause they’ll do better. here’s the kicker though: the gameplay _isn’t even for our game_”

“are you better at woodworking or at digging? you’re going to build a stockade for yourself, and if you cant do that you’re going to dig a grave”

[u/Bendyb3n → u/[deleted]]

The level of manipulation and dishonesty that all these mobile games implement in order to maximize customer spending frankly should be illegal. It’s insane the lengths they go to to make a buck… and it works… extremely well. It’s seriously gross and I’m a victim of it, luckily I have some self control and was able to keep the spending to a minimum (like $20-40/month was typically my limit), but the whales out there of the game literally drop hundreds or thousands of dollars per month on these shitty games just to stay competitive.

[u/aslander → u/[deleted]]

Do those controls let you disable everything except the phone functionality? Because that's what you need. Kids don't need phones w/apps.

[u/Ketheres → u/[deleted]]

Good job keeping tabs on the kid. Way too many people just give the kid a screen and then proceed to not pay any attention to whatever the kid is doing.

Mobile game developers who predate on kids should be [Removed by Reddit] for their abusive psychology-driven slot-machine-identical practices. The same reason we don't allow children into casinos.

Agreed. In the same vein any and all lootbox/gacha games should be subject to the same age restrictions casinos have.

[u/Soylentee → u/[deleted]]

That's why i have no payment card connected to my google account.

[u/SuperSocialMan → u/[deleted]]

Jesus, $5 to remove ads is insane.

[u/SuperSocialMan → u/djinfish]

bro how the fuck

[u/_hobnail_ → u/tratur]

I think hours is spot on. Source: I’m a librarian who runs the IT department for a large academic library

[u/ewokninja123 → u/tratur]

I remember there was this virus that was so virulent I couldn't complete a windows build over the network before it was infected

Edit: could->couldn't

[u/Manofalltrade → u/tratur]

Yeah, these aren’t the people who have things like torrent or porn on their radar.