Goverment inquest into gaming, You can help!

msmalls74

msmalls74

msmalls74

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Dr. Tanya Byron's report will be published in March next year – and YOU can contribute

The UK Government has launched its official ‘call for evidence’ over the risks to young people from violent video games – and is asking you to help the inquiry.

As reported by MCV last month, the research – which also looks at the availbility of ‘violent or pornographic’ material on the internet – is being headed up by Dr. Tanya Byron, who is best known for her work on TV’s House Of Tiny Tearaways.

And the Government has asked members of the industry, concerned parents and other interested parties to answer questions compiled by Byron, which include:

• What are the benefits and opportunities that new technologies offer for children, young people, their families, society and the economy?

• What are the potential or actual risks to children’s safety and wellbeing of going online and playing video games and how do children, young people and parents feel about those risks?

• To what extent do children, young people and parents understand and manage those risks and how well are they supported to do so?

• What, if anything, could be changed in order to help children, young people and parents manage the potential or actual risks of going online or playing video games, and what are the pros and cons of different approaches?

To give your view, email Tanya Byron on [email protected]. The full list of questions can be found here.

The deadline for contributions is 5pm on Friday 30 November, after which the research and Byron’s findings will be presented to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Children, Schools and Families.

The final report will be published at the end of March next year.

Byron said: “Anybody who has children will know that video games and the internet are a part of childhood like never before. This is tremendously positive. New technology is giving kids opportunities to learn, have fun, be creative and communicate in ways that previous generations could only dream of. But many parents still feel ill-equipped to help their children navigate this technology safely.

“By issuing my call for evidence today, I want to start a debate about how Government, industry and society as a whole can support parents to guide our children into the virtual world, with the same confidence as when we show them how to stay safe in our local community.”

Secretary of State for Children for Schools and Families Ed Balls added:

“We all value the great educational, social and entertainment benefits that the internet and video games technologies offer.

"However I know parents want to have information on how their children can take advantage of the positive benefits of these technologies, whilst being able to protect them against the risks.

“It is vital that those who are most informed in these areas come forward and engage with Dr Byron to see what more can be done to help families enjoy video games and the internet safely. I encourage everyone with an interest in this important debate to have their say.”

The project was first set in motion by Gordon Brown on September 5th, when he promised that he would not censor games – regardless of the result of the inquiry.
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Links to the questionaire can be found here
http://www.dfes.gov.uk/byronreview/
 
I hope this doesnt lead to banning or censorship of games. An adult should be able to play an adult game if he/she so wishes. Hopefully itll just lead to nothing more than a more rigorous enforcement of the age ratings on the boxes.
 
The government would be silly to even touch video games beyond ensuring that games are not so freely sold to minors. It's a multi-billion pound industry in the UK.
 
If they take away my video games, watch this space for el revolution!

I seen this on the BBC this morning and they just laid it onto video games, the blame that is. They said video games, then quickly mentioned the internet. The internet is much worse and its the parents fault, cant censor the internet and games are already censored.
 
• What are the benefits and opportunities that new technologies offer for children, young people, their families, society and the economy? - It can train them for terrorist attacks and how to break the law, or brutally murder anyone they don't like

• What are the potential or actual risks to children’s safety and wellbeing of going online and playing video games and how do children, young people and parents feel about those risks? - They'll get groomed and molested by paedophiles, this is wrong, we must ban games and the internet

• To what extent do children, young people and parents understand and manage those risks and how well are they supported to do so? - They understand it fully, and this is why games are evil, and they're fully supported in the crusade to ban them

• What, if anything, could be changed in order to help children, young people and parents manage the potential or actual risks of going online or playing video games, and what are the pros and cons of different approaches? - Ban them to protect the innocent children, so they can go outside and get molested there instead, but at least they won't be learning how to be violent
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O my. Dont serpose due to further research they will decide to advertise in games instead of tv. I know they are trying/tried it on bf2148 but i dont know how its affected the game as i dont have it. Would really **** me off.
 
To be honest if someone is being influenced by a video game to go and slaughter a bunch of kids at their school or whatever scenario, then there are obviously other more deeper mental issues at hand, can't blame a video game for someones mental illness.

But yeah im all for an enforcement of any type of violence in games from being freely available to under 18s, however please don't impose any censorship of games on me just because some mentally unstable kid has gears of war in his xbox and it gets used as a reason why hes taken a gun to school.
 
8igdave said:
O my. Dont serpose due to further research they will decide to advertise in games instead of tv. I know they are trying/tried it on bf2148 but i dont know how its affected the game as i dont have it. Would really **** me off.
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It's basically just the intel core 2 duo/extreme logo on a couple of scenery billboards per level.

That's it, it's hardly noticable although looks a little out of place even though they've tried to blend it in as best as possible
 
adam cool dude said:
Forget about risks of violent video games. They need to look at the risks of MMO's! Can be worse then cocaine addiction in some cases!!!
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This is probably the only video game related aspect that needs looking into but surely the parents should be paying atleast a little bit attention to what their children do with their time. The cant just blame it on the people who made the game when they just ignored the fact that their child was playing the same game 10 hours a day without fail.

This could be easily implemented though, you could simply cap the amount of hours per day/week that the game is able to be played. This could be done by the parent or the game servers themselves could monitor it. At the end of the day i dont think they should be able to enforce anything because the companies behind it havent done a single thing wrong
 
yea i echo that. parents do and have seen computer games as a relatively cheap childminding service for years.

Now games are online and there are much better graphics on display finally parents are taking note of what their kids actually play. Unfortunately they dont seem to realise that buying a game marked 18 for a minor is an issue, or that supervision is required as the internet is not as warm and fluffy as AOL made out it was!
 
done.

I think the the questionnaire focused too much on the assumption of there being a risk involved in computer game and internet usage, So I said this at the end.

Most of my answers said something along the lines of "If parnets get involved and the comes console/internet access device is located in a family room then there will be no risk at all of the child being effected by the content. Responsible parenting is the key."
 
yea but the problem is that the parents would prefer their kids to play games in their own room so that they can watch East bloomin Enders on TV:/

i think that /parents/ are the biggest risk to their childrens well-being.
 
Nickg said:
yea but the problem is that the parents would prefer their kids to play games in their own room so that they can watch East bloomin Enders on TV:/

i think that /parents/ are the biggest risk to their childrens well-being.
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Well eastenders is not on all the time and compromise is something that the children have to learn and the best way to teach is demonstration.

But yes the biggest risk to children is bad parents.
 
Agreed that it lies with the parents really, but obviously this means most kids won't be stopped playing stuff and the last thing we need is to go back to draconian bans of the past.

For an example, at Xmas Day last year I was around a neighbours for a party who had just got an Xbox 360 and we were discussing Gears of War. Another neighbours son of 9 years old, asked the owner if it was alright if he played it. The owner said that he would have to ask his own father first. The kid then explained that he had his own copy at home, so his Dad would have no problem with it. My neighbour insisted on checking with his Father though, and he was fine with it.

His parents are a headmaster and a teacher at a school.... even though the game is plastered with 18 ratings they bought it for him.
 
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