Yes Way, at least according to China. This article is about China's internet addiction among young males and the steps they are taking to stop it. As I read this I was thinking "These fuckers are crazy. I cannot believe they are putting these people in clinics and making them wear these ridiculous helmet/mask things". Then I really started thinking about it. We have internet addicts here, admittedly I use the internet for a lot of things. We have little kids who don't do anything besides email and play video games right after school, but all we do is bitch about it. Well your not going to do anything about the situation by just talking about it folks, and apparently the Chinese are starting to take some action. I like how the last and most important magical step to the rehab is to exercise (read:do something else besides be on a computer for hours). That is pure genius! No wonder they are taking all of our jobs, this is the very reason. Seriously, this is not such a ridiculous idea, mostly just funny because the clinic is located in the same place as the rehab for drugs and alcohol. I can't even imagine the mixing of those three groups of people. Hilarious.
Just in case anyone hasn't been paying attention there has been some serious hoopla recently over videogame violence and its effect on children (Will someone please think of the children...). I swear this crap comes up like every 8 years or so. As the evolution of videogame realism and graphics goes on, people find something new to be offended by. The last huge one I remember clearly was the Mortal Kombat blood in/blood out craze on Genesis and Super Nintendo (Genesis had blood in, Super Nintendo had blood out). For pete's sake, that was a battle that just should have not happened. This time the sparkplug was none other than the new quintessential game of violence: Grand Theft Auto: San Adreas, or more specifically, the Hot Coffee Mod. This one was a doozy. Here you could bang a girl (which you could do before) but this time it was explicitly graphic. Although this was not originally available in the game, performing a few steps would unlock it. Now I agree this is a bit much to be in a videogame, and Rockstar, the maker of the game, apologized/blamed hackers for the whole thing. Unfortunately this has now sparked such a huge nerve in America's golden society that along with public outcry, California has recently passed a law banning the sale of mature games to minors. There is already a videogame ruling board by the way that rates games and puts the warning right on the box (ESRB), but this is different. Furious about this move ESA (entertainment software association) is suing California over the law. I am actually pretty happy about this. There is no need for this banning, mostly because as the law is written it is totally ambiguous. It leaves a lot to interpretation and personal preference of what you think constitutes certain acts. Sounds a lot like what parents should be doing naturally when it comes to their kids, but then people not taking responsibility for themselves is nothing new here. Good luck to ESA.
Last but not least, this is a story that hits close to home. If your reading this that means you most likely have email which surely means you have seen the infamous "Nigerian Money Scam" email or some other variation. This thing has been giving us a black eye for more than enough time. I mean it really sux that a country with as much potential as Nigeria has just as much corruption fighting against that potential. I mean, computer usage is not very high there, but what is there are scams and phishing attempts. Well I guess you gotta start somewhere. Oddly enough, Microsoft has decided to help out Nigeria by teaming up with there Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to stop the so called "419" scams. Good for Microsoft, I like to hear stories about how the evil giant has learned the good lessons of help and sharing, warms my heart.
No comments:
Post a Comment