Digital Smarts - “Our Kids are Walking Around with Slot Machines in their Pockets”

Former Democratic presidential candidate and entrepreneur Andrew Yang wants to see technology and media companies accept more responsibility for their impact on children, even if we don’t yet have research showing exactly what that impact is. Yang, in particular, calls for the government to drastically fund more research and step in, if needed, to incentivize tech companies to educate children, rather than entertain them and  collect ad dollars. (The children’s digital advertising market is expected to be worth $1.7 billion by 2021, according to a report from PwC.)

“Right now, the interests of parents are directly at odds with the interests of the technology companies,” writes Yang in “Our Kids are Walking Around with Slot Machines in their Pockets.” “They’re monetizing our attention and profiting off of our time. As they say, the addictive nature of smartphones is a feature, not a bug. We parents are outgunned and at a total loss.”