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Comment by msephton | Hacker News Reader

The phone may not be dumb (we'll see) but the idea for new Commodore to release one is. Sorry to be so blunt.

I bought one of their C64 repros, it was exactly what I want, I was searching ebay for original Apple ][e at the time anyway.

Why? It's going to be my kids first computer.

Computers today are so absolutely hostile as they are simply attention-sucking sale-terminals. They spend all their time popping up unwanted notifications which are just advertising.

And the interface of modern devices is actually horrible for learning. Some stuff may be intuitive, but the biggest issue is that every slight movement, accidental tap or gesture is linked to something so for kids it's too easy to do something that exits the current program or bring up some sidebar. It's impossible even for me to connect "what did I just do?" with the sudden change in context. It makes it really hard to connect cause and effect. And don't even get me started on how dangerous apps like YouTube are for kids. The recommendation algo seems to surface click-farm scam content in no time. Or weird dopamine traps.

So my kids will start with a device that isn't constantly trying to sell things, they will learn to understand simple systems which has deterministic behavior.

Good luck, I mean that. Times have changed, my kids simply aren't interested in the things I was growing up, so as parents we decided not to force them but rather to positively reinforce whatever it is they want to do. That's not to say they can do whatever they want, of course, but they lead the direction.

Commodore's CEO said in the press release about this phone that he wanted it because he, himself, had become addicted to his smartphone, so he switched to a dumbphone "And my two year-old daughter doesn’t see me staring at something she doesn’t understand for half of the day."

Not to sound overly flippant about it, but that sounds like a "him" problem, not a phone problem? He clearly doesn't see it that way. Instead he's decided that his inability to personally cultivate a healthy relationship to current technology represents a flaw in the technology itself, so we should regress it. Kind of, "Am I so out of touch? No, it's the children who are wrong." vibes.

I'm not a father, so I can't speak with authority, but it seems to me the appropriate approach (given technology's advances will not stop) is to nurture the skills in children that help them navigate the waters, not to drain the sea.

Current phones and online services are designed by the very best in their fields to make you as addicted as possible, so you spend your whole life in front of them. It’s not a self control problem and definitely not the user’s fault. That some are realizing this and want a way out (get these toxic technologies out of their life), I think is a good thing. But you can’t really go with a dumb phone in western societies any more, where every small part of your life requires some app to function (parking, public transport, library, banking, postal services, etc). This phone gives a solution to that. I think it fits a niche and it’s probably a growing one.

Perryfractic also runs a youtube channel that's more nostalgia bait than actually using the products

I stopped watching after he kept "tearing up" when loading a computer. After a few times it seemed totally fake

I'd disagree that the c64 is the platform for learning either though. Sure, plenty of kids learnt that way, but that was out of necessity, not because it's the easiest way to learn

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