I do hope that this photo is Photoshopped. It is not safe neither for baby, nor for xbox. Baby could fall off, xbox overheat.

or is it worring that we have a department for schools childern and the family? sounds a tad orwelenen

Compared to the other things which could be raising the children of busy or distant parents - insipid reality TV, idiot celebrities, professional rapists/pro-footballers and the delicious, nurturing taste of alcopops - being raised by the web is not such a bad fate.

I mean, the whole of human knowledge is available out there for children to learn from. After they get bored of all the porn and warez, that is.

My kids are brought up by World of Warcraft. As far as I'm concerned it teaches them everything they need to know in order to survive in todays brutal world.

For example, it teaches them team spirit, problem solving, decision making and most importantly, how not to draw aggro from the boss.

At my place of work, we generally greed everything (from the stationery cupboard), and only need if it's an upgrade (like getting an electronic stapler to replace the manual one).

These are the skills you MUST learn in life, or you'll end up spending your own money needlessly on scissors, tape and pens.

13 to 18 aren't children, they're young adults. They're angsty and a bit nuts with all the hormones but the raising has been done, pass tense.

And who in the hell turns their cell phone off at night?

Make the internet disappear in a puff of magic smoke and the same parents who don't know what their children do online still wouldn't know what their children are doing most of the time.

Does anyone turn their "cell" off at night? And I'd rather my kids stay in and use the net than hang around on corners drinking and mugging like most of the kids in our area - at least they are expanding thier minds rather than killing brain cells.

Robaux pairs... definitely made my morning.

"And who in the hell turns their cell phone off at night?"

Nothing personal, but how about "anyone who wants to sleep"??

*Personal* phones are for *personal* convenience, and it is bad etiquette to assume otherwise where prior arrangement or convention between individuals is not established. The same goes for the prevalent and frankly bogus assumption that urgent messages can and should be transmitted by text at the last minute.

(Perhaps surprisingly, it was someone older than myself who piqued my wrath on the first point...)

"Nothing personal, but how about "anyone who wants to sleep"??"

my phone stays on all the time incase of emurgencys and outside of sed emurgencyes I have never been called in the medile of the nite

They "admitted to not turning their phone off at night"

Government meeting, in a secret bunker, somewhere in the lake district...

Gordon: Too many children are committing crimes; leaving their phones on overnight.

Blunkett: What effect could this have?

Gordon: Um...It reduces our level of control! It increases the possibility of an uprising!

Cameron: Hmmm....my hair goes even more strange during the night. I wouldn't want anyone taking a picture of me, what with these new camera-phone modern technological wonders!

Blunkett: So what's the solution?

Gordon: Its obvious. Tax mobile phones being switched on...and we could have price bands and everything...this is all so exciting...

My sister is fifteen years old - going on sixteen - and I can say her MSN conversations into the wee hours are probably not good for her health. She spends most of her online time browsing sites like Bebo, and chatting on her IM client. I think the problem is that these websites become pretty addictive, and 'The' way to stay in touch with friends. My parents try to be as strict as they can but at the end of the day, at least she's not out starting fights or drinking. As for mobile phones, children/young adults shouldn't really need them switched on at night to receive texts :\ It'll make them more inclined to check their phone every ten minutes instead of sleep.