"Will someone please think of the children?"

There's a little snippet located at The Register that cites some stats regarding kids/teens and all-night text messaging. It states,

"A survey of Australian children found 42 per cent of boys and 40 per cent of girls were tired enough that their concentration was impaired at school because of late-night texting.

Research in the US found up to 28 per cent of school kids admitting falling asleep in class at least once a week."

How amusing. I remember those nights quite well, myself. The difference is late-night chatting in bed was a lot more uncomfortable ten years ago, as laptops were still pretty sizeable, and I had to make sure that I didn't strain the cable attaching my modem to my phone line. (Especially not when that little plastic tab thing snapped off and refused to anchor into its jack.)

I firmly believe in parents teaching their kids about trust and technology and proper use of it. It's not like texting is this new monster that will threaten kids' safety. When will people see that staying up past their bedtimes is something that children will do because they're children and don't want to go to sleep if something more interesting than "those little slices of death" captures their attention?

I hopped on IRC during the wee hours of the night, and soon thereafter, my brother had his incessant late-night NexTel chirps to talk about absolutely nothing. We both did that just because we could, and we felt like we were getting away with something.

"Telecoms provider ACE-COMM says UK telcos could do more to help parents," says the article. I agree that carriers ought to take some measures keep kids out of where they ought not be (Disney is famous for their precautions and their ability to allow parents to control what kids can access on their mobiles), but ultimately the responsibility rests with parents. If a parent comes crying to a carrier about how they've racked up a gazillion dollars in text messaging charges and that their kid is failing in school because of rampant texting, whose fault is that? What does that say about the parent and his ability to raise his own kid?

Again, Disney has adopted that "we're totally family-friendly" (i.e. "we're big brother with a mickey mouse smile") stance, but their service is aimed at a younger crowd. If a 16 or 17 year old can't tell that failing all his classes because of late-night texting is a bad thing, then, jeebus, he deserves to fail.

It's so simple: moderation, folks, and I don't mean looking over your kids' shoulders to study their MySpace profiles to make sure they're squeaky clean.