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Grand kids a problem

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bilphi

Grand kids a problem
« on: March 15, 2018, 04:49:28 pm »
Whenever my grandkids visit they are constantly telling Alexa to play some awful music. It ends up being a battle with them stopping all their commands to play songs. Is there any way to make Alexa recognize my voice only?it would save what little hair I hav left.

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #1 on: March 15, 2018, 05:33:51 pm »
not at this time.  that is what a belt if for  :-)

mike27oct

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #2 on: March 15, 2018, 05:48:54 pm »
OK, just wait until they te; alexa to set volume 10 without you knowint it!

Now we have to help people discipline their grand kids.  I just told mine to leave the damn thing alone unless thet want to spend some time out alone for a half hour!

Get to know your alexa device better.  They all have a mute the mic button on top.  Press it and you have a red ring.  Don't let the kids see you do this.  If they ask why is there a red ring, tell them it is because the alexa is not working right now, and it might come back on later once the problem is fixed.

I will end this with a big DUH!

malliekm

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #3 on: March 15, 2018, 11:56:33 pm »
OK, just wait until they te; alexa to set volume 10 without you knowint it!

Now we have to help people discipline their grand kids.  I just told mine to leave the damn thing alone unless thet want to spend some time out alone for a half hour!

Get to know your alexa device better.  They all have a mute the mic button on top.  Press it and you have a red ring.  Don't let the kids see you do this.  If they ask why is there a red ring, tell them it is because the alexa is not working right now, and it might come back on later once the problem is fixed.

I will end this with a big DUH!

Sounds like his grandkids are old enough (listening to awful music) to know better and able to read.  Don't think tapping the mute button will work.  They'll just turn it back on.  Here, we'd have a conversation about respecting my property.  If that didn't work, I'd unplug them and hide the cords.  If they complained about that, they wouldn't be coming back over till they learn to be more respectful.  I had to tell my nearly 12 year old grandson, today, no when he asked to spend the night tonight.  Broke my heart :( but he has decided to test us by being disrespectful and argumentative.   That lasted about 5 minutes...4 1/2 minutes longer  than it should have!

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #4 on: March 16, 2018, 04:27:13 am »
gotta teach them what is off limits and punish when they overstep.  I know this, when I was growing up, remotes, refrigerators, radio dials were all off limits.  If I touched, I got punished. 

froglips

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #5 on: April 20, 2018, 01:13:46 pm »
How about just logging out of the account?  That would effectively kill all activity until they leave.  It would be nice if you could have a pin / password activated mute function.

fstbusa

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #6 on: April 23, 2018, 01:40:34 pm »
Its not just the problem with the grandkids... there needs to be a way to enable Parental advisory on the device.  My 6 yr old asks Alexa to play the superman song thinking they will play a superhero theme song or something and its starts playing Superman by Eminem!!!!  Not acceptable!!

Alpha Bitch

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #7 on: April 23, 2018, 03:03:01 pm »
My 6 yr old asks Alexa to play the superman song thinking they will play a superhero theme song or something and its starts playing Superman by Eminem!!!!  Not acceptable!!
BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

That's my jam!!!!!!  Your 6 yr old is a "Slim Shady" fan.  Echo played the right song.  ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

Offline jwlv

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Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #8 on: April 23, 2018, 06:54:57 pm »
You know how Amazon makes a Fire 7 Tablet just for kids? Like this one https://www.amazon.com/All-New-Amazon-Fire-7-Kids-Edition-Tablet/dp/B01J90MSDS that has a lot of parental controls and costs 2-3 times more than a normal Fire 7 tablet.

Well, Amazon doesn't make an Echo device for kids yet. You could suggest to Amazon that they make an Echo just for kids. Maybe it could even have a funny cartoon voice.

Regarding answers or songs that might not be acceptable for young children, you have to think about what most people would want. If a random person asks for the Superman song, would they mean Superman by Enimen or the Superman theme song?

According to Kim Kommando (talk radio host), if you subscribe to Amazon Music Unlimited (AMU), the entire AMU library is fair game. That includes uncensored songs that contains explicit lyrics. I assume that if you do not subscript to AMU and use Prime Music instead, there will not be explicit lyrics.

Here is the full article from Kim Kommando https://www.komando.com/happening-now/443351/is-amazons-echo-exposing-your-kids-to-explicit-music

« Last Edit: April 23, 2018, 07:04:30 pm by jwlv »

Offline jwlv

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Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #9 on: April 23, 2018, 07:34:38 pm »
Reading the past posts on this topic, I just have to voice an opinion on raising kids. I am now a retired teacher but I still work as a sub from time to time. On any given day, I oversaw 200-250 kids (7 periods, 25-35 kids per class) and a few parents who bothered to show up to mandatory meetings. The vast majority of the meetings it becomes clear why the child is behaving the way they do.

It seems that many parents have no desire to parent their kids. They want technology to do their job. I'll take an example from the 1990's when the "v-chip" came about. If you remember, the FCC required new television sets to have v-chips so that parents can block certain ratings on television shows. The rating system included: TV-Y, TV-Y7, TV-Y7-FV, TV-G, TV-PG, TV-14, and TV-MA. So if parents didn't want their child to watch TV-14 and TV-MA shows, they can block it via the v-chip. A PIN would be required to unblock it.

And here's my opinion. Many parents assume that blocking access to something, whether it is a TV show, something on an Echo device, or a password or a physical lock/key on the thermostat, would prevent a child from doing something they were told not to do. That just challenges them to want it more. And if can they find another way to do it without you knowing, they will. They will lie to you and say they didn't because, well, you created the proof for them. You blocked access to it and that block is still there. What parents should be doing is explaining why their child should not do something and the consequences of it when they already know that it isn't allowed. And rules are different from place to place. Like in a certain friend's house, you can eat and drink anywhere but at another friend's house you can only eat and drink in the kitchen. Every child knows the difference between right and wrong, and how to be good and how to be bad. If the child made a bad decision, they must face the consequences of that decision and be reminded of that for the the next several weeks. Let's say little Johnny didn't do his homework and lied about it. He got caught so he is punished by taking away his cell phone for a day. Over the next few weeks, if Johnny asked if he can go out to play with his friends, you might say, "Normally you can go play, but you lied to me about your homework last week. So you can't go out to play today. You did something wrong by lying and you knew that it was bad behavior. If you stay good (affirmation that he's been doing good) then you can go out to play next week." So a gentle reminder of what the child did wrong before will last longer than a 1 day punishment of taking his cell phone away. And the child will know that this reminder/punishment isn't arbitrary. It will end next week under the condition of him staying good. Hopefully by next week, the child will have learned something.

How is a v-chip, a PIN, a lock/key, parental controls, or any technology going to teach a child the same way as I described above?
« Last Edit: April 24, 2018, 03:49:26 am by jwlv »

Offline kenf

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Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #10 on: April 23, 2018, 07:59:59 pm »
jwlv isn't wrong on how to go about parenting instead of relying on technology.

The other complication, and I recall seeing this mentioned somewhere else today, is that the tech evolves quickly and faster than the parents can keep up.

A decade or so ago, when the Playstation Portable (PSP) came out, a teen got herself into sex trafficking trouble  because her parents got her a PSP, had no internet in the house, didn't know about that stuff, and she got on the wifi she could reach from the neighbors.  The parents had no idea this was even possible to suspect they needed to know what their kid was doing on a video game device.

The same is with the Alexa tech.  Our grandparent on this thread aside, how many grandmas know what all Alexa can do or get into?  The kids do.  And they are like gremlins in the machine.


fstbusa

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #11 on: April 25, 2018, 11:13:10 am »
Reading the past posts on this topic, I just have to voice an opinion on raising kids. I am now a retired teacher but I still work as a sub from time to time. On any given day, I oversaw 200-250 kids (7 periods, 25-35 kids per class) and a few parents who bothered to show up to mandatory meetings. The vast majority of the meetings it becomes clear why the child is behaving the way they do.

It seems that many parents have no desire to parent their kids. They want technology to do their job. I'll take an example from the 1990's when the "v-chip" came about. If you remember, the FCC required new television sets to have v-chips so that parents can block certain ratings on television shows. The rating system included: TV-Y, TV-Y7, TV-Y7-FV, TV-G, TV-PG, TV-14, and TV-MA. So if parents didn't want their child to watch TV-14 and TV-MA shows, they can block it via the v-chip. A PIN would be required to unblock it.

And here's my opinion. Many parents assume that blocking access to something, whether it is a TV show, something on an Echo device, or a password or a physical lock/key on the thermostat, would prevent a child from doing something they were told not to do. That just challenges them to want it more. And if can they find another way to do it without you knowing, they will. They will lie to you and say they didn't because, well, you created the proof for them. You blocked access to it and that block is still there. What parents should be doing is explaining why their child should not do something and the consequences of it when they already know that it isn't allowed. And rules are different from place to place. Like in a certain friend's house, you can eat and drink anywhere but at another friend's house you can only eat and drink in the kitchen. Every child knows the difference between right and wrong, and how to be good and how to be bad. If the child made a bad decision, they must face the consequences of that decision and be reminded of that for the the next several weeks. Let's say little Johnny didn't do his homework and lied about it. He got caught so he is punished by taking away his cell phone for a day. Over the next few weeks, if Johnny asked if he can go out to play with his friends, you might say, "Normally you can go play, but you lied to me about your homework last week. So you can't go out to play today. You did something wrong by lying and you knew that it was bad behavior. If you stay good (affirmation that he's been doing good) then you can go out to play next week." So a gentle reminder of what the child did wrong before will last longer than a 1 day punishment of taking his cell phone away. And the child will know that this reminder/punishment isn't arbitrary. It will end next week under the condition of him staying good. Hopefully by next week, the child will have learned something.

How is a v-chip, a PIN, a lock/key, parental controls, or any technology going to teach a child the same way as I described above?

While I totally agree to your assessment... I've told my kids that they cannot play songs that mom or dad haven't approved.  Now they have a Spider-Man theme song they love to play.  Its totally innocent.  The kids being super hero fans get curious and ask to Alexa to play a superman song..... it plays inappropriate material for them.  I agree that maybe we(as parents) didn't approve of the song that played but, the kids also innocently tried to play a similar super hero song and thats not what was given to them.... It would be nice to have some method of shielding them from a situation like this.

Offline kenf

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Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #12 on: April 25, 2018, 12:03:00 pm »
I just saw this article today about the new Kid version of a Dot:
https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/25/17276164/amazon-echo-dot-kids-edition-freetime-price-announcement-features-specs

but before we gripe about the price, read the section about the "FreeTime" feature, that even the basic, free version of that we can enable on existing echoes has.


fstbusa

Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #13 on: April 26, 2018, 08:33:32 am »
I saw the email come through yesterday regarding the kids dot and also saw it on a news channel.... I don't want a specific device for my children.  I just want the parental controls on all my current ones.

Offline kenf

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Re: Grand kids a problem
« Reply #14 on: April 26, 2018, 09:51:21 am »
I saw the email come through yesterday regarding the kids dot and also saw it on a news channel.... I don't want a specific device for my children.  I just want the parental controls on all my current ones.

you should read that Verge article.  ignore the specific SKU they've put together for $79 of a Dot, a condom, a 2 year warranty and 1 year subscription to the paid mode of FreeTime.

FreeTime is a service with free and paid mode.  All Echoes can use it.  So when it comes out on May 9, you can use it.

That's the relevant feature.