I think you're missing the point.
Children don't need to worry about breaking AdSense rules and getting their accounts blocked, especially if they have accounts dedicated for school.
Children also will have internet at school.
Children don't need to worry about breaking AdSense rules and getting their accounts blocked, especially if they have accounts dedicated for school.
Children also will have internet at school.
And how does this 1000 USD compete with 250 USD boxes?
That is to say, I'm sure Microsoft has data that "shows" these will be cheaper to administrate and support than Chromebooks. Combine that with all the software you can install, or offline workflows, etc and Microsoft comes out on top (according to Microsoft).
It's how Microsoft has always done things. I'm not here saying it's right or wrong, I'm just trying to answer your question.
With phones, tablets, and now cheap school laptops, their timing didn't allow that. Google has already succeeded with the classic Microsoft strategy, all the way down to commoditizing the hardware vendors. Microsoft is instead coming in as a semi-premium option, combined with inertia/safety as a brand trusted by enterprises. The same play is a bit more successful in cloud computing, but they're still losing to AWS who are nailing the classic Microsoft strategy. Assuming they continue to decline in their ability to rapid-follow in new technology platforms, I expect they'll look more and more like Oracle and IBM.
Edit: To be clear, I would never blame them for wanting to stop a cascading explosion of emails. But I also wouldn't say it's impossible for a child to get an account banned.
"5.4 You agree that you will not engage in any activity that interferes with or disrupts the Services (or the servers and networks which are connected to the Services)."
It doesn't surprise me that your child could trigger accidentally one of those super ban. At least it's not that bad, they could have banned your account too.
I mean, I use Google products all the time. But I have multiple accounts ready to go, and everything important backed up offline, because I work in IT, and I've dealt with too many horror stories.
Google products work wonderfully until they don't, and the trigger to account loss may be a complete accident. And there is virtually no recourse when it does.
Their systems are not as foolproof as people seem to think. I've gotten other people's pictures in my photostream, and other people's appointments in my calendar. I'm sure it goes the other way, too, and that is something that 100% should be on your mind whenever you use their services.
I'm worried most of all that Google will use some sort of sentiment analysis or other machine learning tool to classify kids based on academic ability and build a sort of "cognitive profile" on children as they age.
The privacy notice provided by Google for their G Suite for Education is available here: https://gsuite.google.com/terms/education_privacy.html
It clearly states "Google does not serve ads in the Core Services or use personal information collected in the Core Services for advertising purposes."
Is the evidence that indicates this is not true? Is this in relation to non-core services that school administrators may opt into?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2015/12/28...
The alternative, in this case using a Microsoft Surface Laptop instead, should raise many of the same concerns. With the tight coupling of online services and single account sign-on options that Microsoft offers, similarly extensive advertising and usage profiles can be built.
I'm more worried about the future misuse of all the accumulated data from their access and version control logs for cloud-based documents, internet browsing behavior, multi-player gaming sessions, personal emails, and all of the other forms of trackable interactions that my kids (and the rest of us) generate with on a daily basis.
It doesn't keep me up at nights -- but the paranoid part of me thinks it should.
I.e. I see targeted ads regularly, so I know that I am being tracked by google et al, but this does not upset me. Can you help me understand why this should upset me?
Some enterprising startup fed that data into a simple ML algorithm and correlated it against other publicly available data. Turns out, your search history as a kid partially predicts adult outcomes like salary, grades in college, chance of bankruptcy, chance of arrest, etc. That startup sells this info to Experian, who adjusts their credit scores accordingly.
Trouble is companies and law enforcement frequently abuse information, and even when they don't, they get hacked by other people who do.
Especially if we're talking about children and young adults, where even "you watch that tv show?" can be a source for social discomfort.
It's difficult to categorically ban advertising in a free society, but at least in the U.S. speech that does nothing more than propose a commercial transaction is subject to lower First Amendment protections, and the combination of harmful effects on children and the lack of any benefit probably get you over the First Amendment hump in that specific scenario.
Children don't grasp the potential consequences of companies maintaining registries of people searching for really personal things.
I'm ok with google knowing my location every second, I'm ok with receiving targeted shopping ads about watches after I browse watches on Amazon. I block ads when I feel like it, it's no skin off my bones.
It's not like men in black suits accost me at bus stops and force fliers into my hands with targeted ads. It's in my mind, literally harmless.
1. People are assuming I support advertising, and advertising to children
2. People are angered by that and thus downvote me.
All I'm intending to do is clarify why readers don't like the concept of advertising, or advertising to children. Is this offense, to ask for a clarification?
Not sure why the downvote brigade decided to drop by your comment.
If it is like a corporate accounts in other places then yes, no need to worry about blocking the account.
What we need is for Google's school/office apps and their storage to become open-source commodities that are self-hosted. "Self-hosted" can then involve any balance of self/outsource you or your organization would like.