Actually, installing a CD ROM drive, sound blaster and configuring sound drivers, autoexec and config for dos were instrumental for me. Laptops. Smfh.

I'm playing the equiv of Minecraft (Luanti) and my 4 year old sits on my lap and helps me jump and use the two mouse buttons. Usually stuff like this begins with the parent's habits.

This is prime bonding that they might not remember when they’re older, but will make your job as a parent 10,000x easier. 🎉

Ah yes, the various internet porn, liveleak and rotten [dot] com generation of kids

Laptop kids gain tech skills

IPad kids gain social media brain

Change my mind

iPads are content consumption devices. Full stop.

I remember having to wait some 30s to a full minute for a single image to load via dialup

Well mine know what a terminal is and can execute the commend needed to launch a Java Minecraft server instance soo you're not wrong ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

My kids will be playing the same sacred edutainment games from 1992-2005 as I did on a virtual Windows XP machine and this is unironically a hard non-negotiable for any serious long term partner

instead they are being raised AI/ phone kids which is probably worst, for genz, alpha. mIlleneals are desktop/laptop kids.

My kid used to sit in my lap and press 'w' in Goat Simulator to move us forwards while I ensured the chaos happened. Eventually they added the jump button to their repertoire. Then they learned to use controller so we could play Goat Simulator 3 together in split screen. Eventually they moved out of my lap and they have their own computer now.

We used to play an hour together every day. We 100%'ed Terraria, played through PalWorld, Bluey, A Hat in Time, Vampire Survivors, and a few others. They play through single player games on their own after school nowadays, so that hour each night has been repurposed for reading together. We still play together on the weekends.

They'll occasionally ask if I remember the silly games we played in Goat Simulator 3, like where we'd both equip brooms, one of us would steal the other's broom and fly away, leaving the broomless goat to dramatically monologue about how their broom was stolen. Those moments gaming together are precious, and I hope you and your kid enjoy them.

I teach in a makerspace and I have to start every new class by teaching the basics of using a mouse and keyboard. It is really hard to teach 3D modelling to students who have no idea what modifier keys or a scroll wheel is.

I miss the laptop generation. The phones are good for consuming they are not good for creating.

Cyberdeck kids slay

Desktop kid checking in.

Like the gods intended, with Model M keyboard and US robotics dial-up.

Better than iPad kids. Not ideal obviously, but still far better.

iPads (and mobile devices/OS's generally) are designed to be as simplistic and easily understood as possible. They abstract away complexity, have to make menus less cluttered and make buttons larger to accommodate how people use them, and the lower power processors also mean less functionality than desktop-based systems.

If you grow up using less shit, you'll learn how to use less shit.

Someone once snuck a porn image with an Asian lady in a "Christmas" CD of a magazine, those with apps and media and an auto play menu. You could only find it if you opened the disc as a folder with right click and browsed deep into the subdirectories... Which I of course as a kid with nothing to do, at a time when you paid internet connection based on time, did. It was an indescribably wonderous discovery.

I'm going to spoil the shit out of my nephew for Xmas this year who's just old enough now for some video games with the approval/encouragement of my sister. A fully loaded 3DS XL with a compatible NDS flashcart too plus emulators, themes, and whatever else it sat in a drawer for years with last installed. Battery still good. Hopefully it gives him the tinkering bug with Nintendo's locked down sandbox blown apart day 1.

Loonix laptop when he's a little older.

Computer kids will always be more tech savvy than touchscreen kids. They'll have better critical thinking skills and better abilities to apply their knowledge in ways that aren't spelled out for them by patronizing tech companies like Google and Apple pushing their walled gardens.

I have a one year old daughter.
She is going to learn how to work windows explorer and windows shortcuts and learn how a mouse works before she's ever put in front of any apple product.

If you want to teach your children useful computer skills, teach them Linux.

Still way too easy to get confused in layers of abstraction on Linux. Go big or go home, get a Commodore 64.

Well, personally, I prefer to keep mine locked up in the basement.

Aw, what's wrong with it?

I meant the children.

I'm a former desktop kid and it shows in my habits of today. I got a desktop computer at age 10, Android smartphone in my mid-teens, switched to a laptop only at age 18, got my first tablet only in my late 20s.

It's literally my default activity when I'm at home to sit at my desk where a laptop is connected to two computer screens. In fact that's what I'm doing right now. Meanwhile my tablet is lying somewhere on the couch and I haven't touched it in weeks, it's probably not even charged anymore.

Bring the commie to the basement.

Yeah similar. Got my first tablet at 19 and even that was a eink one for uni work.

Put my 2 yo in front of CS 1.6 the other day. She managed to switch the game from one screen to the other and I have no idea how. Guess I’m going for the next donk then.

Indeed, brother! Unlike the unwashed masses of today, we do not "scroll". Laying on a couch and "scrolling"? NAY, we sit down in our delectable chairs with lumbar support, at our adjustable desks with perfect posture, we "browse", we "SURF" the TRUE internet! Unlike those who believe that "the internet" is just a grouping of the 5 most popular websites.

I do scroll on my smartphone too, but not usually when I'm at home, because I have a desktop computer there, way more convenient.

I used to do the same when I was single, but now I can't set up a desktop in the family living room, so I'm using a laptop instead (and a NAS for storage). There are a lot of moments where I'm thinking that it would be nice to plop down behind a desktop for a moment, but it's too impractical to set up the laptop and put it away afterwards, which is a shame.

My kids are using an old laptop (running Linux) for gaming. I've been thinking about whether it would be good to give them an old desktop at some point, so they can do some tinkering. But the mobility advantage of laptops is real, so that's a dilemma. Maybe I'll just let them choose at some point.

I don't know how your 2yo would have managed that, but that's often something you can change in the settings menu.

Me when the Southwestern Bell sales rep offered my dad free call waiting and I could finally stop getting in trouble for spending all day on the [dial up] internet when my parents weren't home.

Also, no Robux gifts (or Roblox at all, for that matter). They're getting real games from GOG, Itch, and Steam.

Most likely a key combination

The iPad does not make the kid stupid. The kid that is stupid was already going to be stupid, tablet or not. Blaming "the tablet" or "the videogame" for the kid's behavior is like blaming pencils for getting bad grades, and simple-minded folks rely on this.
I've grown up (as have many of you) seeing others growing up, and have seen a couple generations of kids grow up after me as well.
All traits are on a normal distribution. The kids that are smart will learn all day long with an iPad, and will find videos of kids making songs about addition and multiplication. The dumb kids will spend all day 6-7-ing.
Since traits lie on a normal distribution, the majority of people have the muppety idea that "it's the tablet that is bad - can't be my kid" while having passed muppet traits along.

Yea, I switched to Bazzite a little while ago; she apparently found some key combination I wasn’t aware of :D

You think I’d still have perfect SAT scores if instead of reading 500 books in high school I spent my time playing World of Warcraft? Get a grip.

Gotta get that PrismLauncher to play those modpacks for way too much time :D

They are extremely powerful for creative things too? I have a relatively new pro iPad and it doesn't have any social media on it, just like 30 apps for art, CAD work/lidar scanning, remote music apps for production/djing, and actual music creation apps. Pretty sure you can also get a terminal and remote desktop apps if you need. The case also has a keyboard and touchpad.

I won't argue that most people are just using their iPads for tiktok and Instagram, but that definitely isn't close to what an iPad does best.

True. But this is a rarefied use case that doesn’t apply to 99% of teenage iPad users, at least in my pedagogical experience. Keep in mind the average ACT score for college-bound seniors in Florida is 18. Meaning these kids literally can’t even read. They’re not using iPads for anything resembling creativity.

Even better, desktop kids. And then when time comes to upgrade their rig they can research and do it themselves (with some supervision).

It's also nicer imho when the internet is in a specific place in the house.

... sent from my phone

Wow that ad goes so hard rofl

I can guarantee there are kids who are using iPads for coding at this very moment

Just realised that gen z are going to wax on alpha about growing up without conversational bots like elder millennials wax about growing up pre internet

gameboy kids

Raised a kid on a pc, gen Z, he has no idea how anything works and his eyes go glassy any time we try to explain anything. Millennials are the unique in being more computer literate because we grew up with it.

I'm gonna raise a Linux kid

If there will ever be a socioeconomic time fit for child making, that is

The next generation might be looking at RAM the same way the current generation is looking at houses with the way things are going...