Chinese Govt Limits Kids to 3hrs of Online Gaming

1MC writes "The Chinese govt is requiring game houses to modify MMOG's to restrict under 18 users to 3 hours "productive" gameplay per day. This "anti-addiction" software must be in place within 4 months, with games not compliant by July 15 liable to be shut down in China. Net9, Shanda and NetEase will be moving to comply with the government regulations. Users will have to register with their real names and Chinese identity card numbers to be allowed access to the games."

I disagree

from the thank-god-i'm-over-18 dept.

I'd rather say, thank-god-i'm-not-in-china!

Re:thank-god-they-got-something-right

These sad souls need guidance, rehab, a life, something outside the warm cocoon of fat rolls and 3d dwarf landscapes.

On the contrary, one ought to decide for himself if he wants to live in the ``cocoon of fat rolls and 3d dwarf landscapes.'' Through observation, it has been noticed that children of a certain age are unable to make this decision for themselves (though, I must say that 18 is far too old to be considered the time one becomes an adult. It should be 16, in my opinion), it is the duty of parents to make this decision. Never the government. I would much rather see my children spending 24 hours a day playing silly games than be regulated in those matters by the state.

Re:thank-god-they-got-something-right

> I think the distinction between "government" and "family" is actually a little artificial

I think this is one of the most wrong things I've ever read.

A parent has a direct compelling desire to protect and nurture his/her child. The parent has intimate knowledge and experience of that child's unique requirements. The parent has a genetic drive to insure the child's welfare. I can tell you as a parent that this drive is powerful and in the same realm as the drive for food and shelter. I feel the need to care for my child the same way I feel the need to eat.

The "government" is not a single entity, but the resultant vector of millions of competing agendas and forces. As such it doesn't "care" for any child and it doesn't have knowledge of any child. It can only set broad policies that hopefully indirectly cause "good" but often cause "bad" in it's pursuit of particular agendas.

Corporations and Governments are not people. They are not living entities, although we often treat them as such legally.
To say the "government" can care for a child is simply incorrect. A teacher, a nanny, a social worker, a lawyer and a congressman may be affecting a child, but there is no such person as "the government".

Re:thank-god-they-got-something-right

These sad souls need guidance, rehab, a life, something outside the warm cocoon of fat rolls and 3d dwarf landscapes.

Without commenting on your arrogant assertion that you know how someone else should live their live, this rises up a rather interesting point: why does the Chinese government want children to spend their time in reality rather than virtual reality ? After all, people playing WoW are far less likely to demand freedom or engage in other activities antithethical to the Chinese political system than people spending their time speaking with each other and perhaps coming up with dangerous ideas lie freedom from censorship. Warm cocoon makes people drowsy, cold reality shocks them wide awake. The former makes it far easier for the Chinese government to stay in power than the latter.

Is this a case of a tyrant starting to believe his own lies about his benevolence, or does the Chinese government just have absolute confidence in their iron fist ?

Re:thank-god-they-got-something-right

It's because of the culture. I don't know whether you've noticed, but Asian parents tend to put a lot of value in studying. They want their children to study hard and to go to a good university and to get a good job. The thought of your own child being addicted to games and neglecting school is the fear of every Chinese parent.

You know, not every government decision has to be associated with suppression and regime.

Re:Sad News, Don Imus dead at 83

...rap is for idiots without jobs or a real culture.

Um, poverty is a real culture. I grew up with a single mom that probably messed with drugs a bit more than she should have. Then I messed around with drugs more than I should have. I grew up in poverty and through a lot of hard work I've gotten a college education and so has my sister. The fact that we are all where we are today doesn't for an instant mean that we can't identify with music that targets those living in a "self perpetuating cycle of self-inflicted poverty and crime". The culture of poverty even the culture of crime is about improving your situation. I know it may not seem like it from the outside looking in, but drug addiction and crime are both things that many people do in order to improve their situation if only for a short time. Eating is better than not, getting high is better than jumping off a bridge. Other issues are highly emotional, it's hard when a child or relative dies because you cannot afford proper medical treatment, it's hard when someone becomes an alcoholic rather than a moderate drinker, it's hard when your parents argue every night because of bills, it's hard for people who are black and cannot afford a train ticket in order to look for work. You sit on a high horse claiming that this music contributes to the problem, when you do this you take focus away from the real problems, like drug addiction, lack of education, lack of jobs and a general lack of hope a lot kids face every day. You also apply a double standard when you don't say the same of art like Tom Sawyer, Gangs of New York, and many other stories, movies and songs that stretch back to the begining of man.

Re:Guns don't kill people, niggers kill people.

Dude, I read everything you wrote. I have only three words to say: you are sick.

I would imagine...

That kids getting caught faking identities to get around this would be dealt with harshly by the government.

Parents (or kids?) going to jail because junior wanted to play WoW for more than 3 hours a day and faked ID?

China is repressive

China is really repressive of their younger generation gaming online, primarilly because their dissident groups start up from these under 18 people being online. Stopping them from gaming as much will help disrupt bonds between the groups and cause slightly less anti-government behavior.

Of course I think their system will collapse in a few years because of this anyway, but it is likely to stave off the inevitable for a little while at least.

Re:China is repressive

Working against the existence of dissident and anti-government groups usually leads to subversive and resistance groups in short order. Bite them in the ass indeed.

Re:Also...

Arguably, so are most of our elected officials.

Re:China is repressive

Emphasis mine:

You really should look up the industrial revolution, and how many, many governments suddenly found themselves forced with the decision to either change to a more open form of government, or face open revolt.

Good working conditions actually give people inspiration to try to change their government

Since when did the industrial revolution create good working conditions? It did the opposite -- made small farming not tenable, drove workers to the cities where they, if they were lucky enough to have jobs, faced awful working conditions. Mass unemployment provided the time and incentive for overthrow of government.

If you're looking at philosophical movements among the wealthy, sure. Such activities require financial independence. But as for mass political movements, economic dissatisfaction is almost always required.

Oh no!

Looks like I'll have to look to India for my gold farming.

Can't they just restrict their manufacturing to 3 hours a day too?

I wish US players had to do this...

...so that under-18 players could be restricted to certain servers, and the rest of us could play in peace, basking in the huge decrease in leetspeek, ninja looters, griefers & beggars.

Seriously though, this whole "nanny state" the Chinese have going over there just cracks me up. I wonder if one can "bank" one's hours by not playing for a few days, in order to have enough time to join an end-game raid without worrying about one's big-brother software logging you off at an inopportune time.

Sadly, it's not that simple

Sadly, it's not that simple. We all like to pretend that surely only kids do this and that, and grown ups are all responsible and polite and whatnot. Dream on.

Point in case, I actually know a mid-40's mid-level manager who speaks l33t in MMOs. Shocked the heck out of me to hear (ok, read) him online chatting in what I imagined to be typical loser-kid speak. The poor sap probably imagines that adopting that lingo makes him all cool and hip online.

I know a guy in his 50's whose online life consists pretty much of being a die-hard ganker. That's how he gets his jollies. Ganking newbies.

Also, let's just say there must be a reason why the stereotype about all the "horny naked teenage female" characters online is to assume it must be a fat 40-year-old guy, and not, say, that it must be a 14 year old guy. 'Nuff said.

Conversely, I've been grouped with more than enough 14 year olds and even (according to himself) a 11 year old, that could actually play the game pretty darn well and functioned perfectly well in a group.

Now I'm not saying that either covers 100% of the group. ("All generalizations are false, including this one.") Just that you can't take it for granted that kids = "leetspeek, ninja looters, griefers & beggars", and adults = cool.

As for the nanny-state part, actually I hope that it's _not_ possible to bank hours. The chinese have my sympathy, but from a selfish bastard point of view: maybe having to deal with the chinese market will finally hammer it into everyone's head that 40-man 8-hour raids are _not_ fun. If it's not possible to do it in 3 hours, including getting the group, that should be anyone's hint that it's probably not that much fun. If you end up having some sort of _duty_ to the guild to be there daily at hour X, because 39 others depend on you, it's not fun. Time sinks are ok only when done in moderation, not when you need to quit your job or give up sleep to even be able to join.

Again, I'm aware that it's a very selfish and nasty thing to say, cheering at someone else's problems. So don't take it too seriously. But, still, if it's happening anyway, it might as well give some designers some clue.

If China really wants to help kids...

How about it starts by improving the country's dismal human rights record? I would be a lot less worried about my kid playing too much WoW than I would be about the possibility that he could be thrown in prison for the rest of his life because he made a speech at his school bad-mouthing the government.

Re:If China really wants to help kids...

Pictures at eleven.

What are you talking about? All I see are happy pictures of happy people hanging around China's grand Tiananmen Square [google.cn]. It sounds like you've been listening to too many American conspiracies! Would you like to visit our special hotel for American conspirists?

Read the article.. not the summary- no time limit

FTFA: "Under the system, known as the "anti-online game addiction system", the first 3 hours of play for each day is considered "healthy", during which players will be awarded full points in the virtual world. The next 2 hours will yield only half the normal points and there will be no points after 5 hours. "

This is not to restrict kids online playtime

Users will have to register with their real names and Chinese identity card numbers to be allowed access to the games.

THAT is the real reason. Register for this...soon register for ALL internet use.
"We want to know who you are and where you go."

Re:This is not to restrict kids online playtime

I'm actually quite surprised I had to read this far down in the comments to find someone else who caught that.

Hearing China freak out about video game and internet addiction so much lately has raised some weird red flags with me. The Chinese government has a lot of reasons to keep people offline, and online gaming is one of those things the Great Firewall of China (the existence of which the government denies) they can't control as tightly. This is another subtle way to keep their citizenry in line.

Re:it's so sad that China that gets it right

Ok, I know I shouldn't feed the trolls, but...

There was a time - back when I was actively playing a MMORPG (Final Fantasy XI) that I would have agreed with the idea that MMORPGs are addictive. However, my experiences over the last year or so have made me far less certain.

I started playing FFXI in November 03, importing a copy from the US when it launched there. For the first couple of months, it was just a curiousity... something I logged into once in a while and ran around a bit. Then somebody else I knew in real life started playing. And then another. The amount of time I was putting into the game increased considerably, to the point where it was taking up well over 50% of my non-work time (I have what's essentially a 9-5 office-based job). I was going out less, particularly at the weekends, playing other games less and watching fewer movies (never complain about MMORPG monthly fees - you wouldn't believe how much money they save you). About the only other past-time that didn't suffer was reading.

I got heavily into the game. I did the whole end-game thing, with all the grief and drama that went with it. I slogged through the Chains of Promathia expansion, which was exhausting, frustrating, and infuriating, but also responsible for some of the biggest adrenelin rushes I've ever had from gaming.

At this point, if the addiction analogy were really true, the next stage of the story should write itself; losing contact with real life friends and family, locking myself away in a darkened room, losing my job, dying alone in poverty etc. Except... it didn't. Some time last summer, I noticed that I just didn't quite care about the game as much as I had in the past. Logging in felt more like a chore, the game itself rarely did much for me and I was losing interest in the community. Over the next few months, my play time dwindled rapidly. By Christmas, I was only logging in for a couple of hours a week for scheduled Limbus runs. By February, even that had stopped.

There was no dramatic intervention. No moment when I realised I needed to go cold-turkey. In fact, I never did go cold turkey. I've still got the game installed and still pay $15 a month for my account. I just don't log into it, because I can't be bothered. It's not that I've moved onto another MMORPG. I have a WoW account, which I do log into occasionally, but I just don't find that game fun enough to grip me for long periods. Rather, I've more or less gone back to using my free time to do the things I did before FFXI came along. I'm not alone in this... the real life friends who got into FFXI shortly after I did followed a similar trajectory.

Now, compare that to how a genuine addiction works. I've known lots of smokers. I've also known a guy who started smoking cannabis at 15 and who was dead of a heroin overdose at 23. I've never known a smoker just give up the habit because they found cigarettes just didn't do much for them any more. From what I've seen (and I've never smoked), giving up smoking is painful (emotionally and perhaps even physically) and requires a good chunk of will-power. When drug users find that their current drug of choice doesn't do much for them any more, the response seems to be to move onto something harder.

MMORPGs have the effect on people they do for a number of reasons - interesting game worlds, clear goals of the kind that people lack in their real lives (this one is important), the ability to act out fantasies, a sense of worth from standing in a virtual community and so on. However, I can no longer believe that genuine addiction is one of the factors at work in most cases.

This is good

Due to the prevalence of these cafes and the ungodly amount of time younger kids WASTE here, hopefully these laws will encourage these kids to do other more productive things in their free time. Kids are not known to be responsible, especially on items good for their own welfare. I'm not saying a little wasted time is a bad thing, but spending so much time on these type of games can have a serious negative impact on the social life of the kids and their school grades. I know several people who have dropped out of college or have trouble holding jobs due to these addictions. Granted, I'm sure some kids will find ways to get around this (like alternate between cafes). But it is the hassle of doing so that will hopefully encourage kids to limit themselves.

Chinese Party Youth League moves meeting

The 24x7 Chinese Communist Party Youth League meetings in popular role-playing games have been rescheduled to 1700-2000 hours, effective August 1.

Unchanged is the mandatory attendance policy.

All those "good for kids" morons should wake up

and wake up now -

if you BAR kids from doing something they REALLY like and WANT to do in their development stages, and instead FORCE them to do whatever society/you think right and should be done, what you do is going to come back to you as payback when kids reach adulthood and start to exhibit personality/psychological deviations.

ANYTHING that is suppressed gets bigger and strikes back at a later date.

this same trend was here in turkey aroun 15-20 years ago, all kids were put to the "career race", which was something that was seen as both good for the kids, and for the society. (hey, you make the kid race for ranking at the top in the national university entrance exams, which guarantees them a good education and then later a respectable, high salary job, what can be wrong with that)

and 15 years later now, majority of those generations are experiencing personality quirks, antisocial behaviour, a degree of childish selfishness, (which leads to MANY marriages to breaking up), strike-back from stress that is accrued in 15 years of organizational education/racing, aimlessness in life and valueing/judging everything on merits of career/power/monetary values and not able to appreciate real values like love, compassion, friendship, family and so on. hell, there are so many stuff that i dont know if i can stop once i start.

you, chinese are total morons for approving that, or forcing your kids to forfeit their present for their future, a future which never comes and constant sacrifice continues while trying to reach it.

time spent NEVER comes back. NEVER EVER. at deathbed what people think are what they HAVE done, not what they MEANT to do.

Comments miss the point

Saying the big human rights problem with China is their restriction of online gaming is like saying the problem with Bob Jones University is not supporting Linux on the network. [bju.edu]

Other "Features"?

I wonder what other features this software has. Are these Game-Houses typically internet cafes? If so are these computers also used for web browsing?

Sure sure, I know China's already got the tap on these places. The sites these users visit (that aren't blocked), are probably logged for easy reviewing access. But it sure would be nice to tie browsing (and game-playing) history to one person, regardless as to what computer he sits at or cafe's he visits.

Monitoring in-game chat would also be a "nice" feature.

-Derek