Kids and cell phonesFollow

It's possible to find phones without cameras attached, but it's getting harder and harder to find them. Which is kind of a problem for people who work in restricted access sites (where oddly, they don't want you walking in and out with a camera of any kind).

It seems like 12-13 is a pretty standard age for most kids to get cell phones. That's about the age where they're going to be hanging out with friends and involved in other activities where they'll be out of your sight more often than just to/from school. Don't spend a lot of money on the phone. In fact, make sure the first phone you buy them is cheap, but with a promise that if they don't lose it and follow the rules, they'll get one with more features in a year (next birthday/christmas/whatever).

Either don't enable texting at all, or pay for an unlimited plan. Unless the phone/plan is completely pre-pay, you might get screwed doing it any other way. If you get a limited plan, make sure it's of the "we shut off the feature at X minutes" and not "you get the pre-pay rate up to x minutes, then we charge you the big bucks". I've just heard way to many nightmare stories about that. In any case, you'll want to make sure that the voice connection will always work no matter where the minutes are, which can be a problem with a hard limited minutes plan. The whole point of the phone is so that you can contact your child, and your child can contact you. If hitting some cap prevents that from happening, then the purpose of the phone is defeated and that'll suck.


The parents are always going to be the best judge of their child, of course. But I don't think it's out of the ordinary for kids to get cell phones around middle school age. The biggest factor is responsibility, and only you can judge that.

He has a DS and we have 2 computers, a Wii and Xbox 360. I think he's got the game thing covered, lol.

Not sure if it's been mentioned, but I do believe there are downloadable applications for your computer to monitor your child's cell usage. Every incoming/outgoing text and call can be recorded. I think I saw it on Oprah or something. Anyway, if you really feel justified and have good reasons to get a young child a cell phone, they certainly don't deserve any sort of right to privacy with how they use it. Do some googling and find out some solutions. Plus, another added benefit some companies have is the child tracker thing, where you can use the phone's GPS so you know where your kid is at all times. The pros are pretty heavy, especially for a young actress.

Darn tootin'.

On a side note, when I asked my mom for a Gameboy for Christmas way back when, she got me an Atari Lynx. In many ways, the Atari Lynx was actually better than the Gameboy. And the fact that no one else had an Atari Lynx so you couldn't exactly link them up and play with them didn't really matter to me, because I was a girl, so none of my friends liked video games anyway.

I still have the Atari Lynx. And it still works. It has a color screen, which the Gameboy didn't at the time.

So.... Anyone want to buy an Atari Lynx...? I've got about a dozen games for it.

Oh man...I remember that whole period, when everyone had GameBoys (except me) and the one or two iconoclastic hip kids got the Lynx instead and it was soooo awesome!

If I had some money, I'd grab that up and give it tom Thom when he turned six or so.

Right now, he's two and a half. He likes pointing at the characters moving around the screens when we play EQ2 and hitting the spacebar to make them jump.

My wife has held on to a small horde of old-school gaming systems so that one day she can edjumicate Thom in the ways of classic video gaming, which apparently means playing Mortal Kombat and Legend of Zelda on half a dozen NES units.

I'll just throw this out there: I'm almost 27 years old and I still don't own a cell phone.


(The one that I have to carry for work every two weeks when I'm on call doesn't count...)

Or swinging on a rope vine across a pit of alligators...

I just downloaded a couple of oldies on the Wii. A Link to the Past and Ogre Battle. <3 the Wii and the classic games.

You can download both Ogre Battle games on Wii virtual console.

Edited, Aug 3rd 2010 7:49am by AshOnMyTomatoes

Yep, getting the one for the 64 next. The only thing I don't like about the original is that once you start a campaign, you're kinda there for an hour or two. No saving. That was easier for me when I was younger, but now I get interrupted so much.

Never played the one for the 64, but I've read good things about it.

It'll seem old school and stuff, but a pager is a delicious way to let her know you wanna talk to her RIGHT NOW without taking the risks of texting and talking and all that.

I was talking to some else and they brought up a good point. They live in Hollywood and brought up the point that sometimes a cell phone is needed when you're on the set. Even though an adult would be with Charmaine at all times because she's a minor but on the set, sometimes a quick text is needed to be sent to her from production on change of blocking or something and they don't want to intrude and mess up the set.

Man, even I don't want to subject today's youth to that game...


Totally missing out on Yar's Revenge though