I want one!

[pegkerr]

Here is an interesting recently published article on Salon about parents reaching for technological answers to their anxieties about the safety and whereabouts of their children. Certainly this is in keeping with the recent discussion touched off in this journal when there was an erroneous report of an abduction in a park nearby in my neighborhood (here and here).

But what really delighted me in the article was the news that Microsoft is apparently working on a version of the Weasley Clock.

I want one!



(Not necessarily to deal with anxiety over family member whereabouts, you understand. Just because it would be so much fun! And yeah, I definitely want to have a place on the clock where the hands can point to "Mortal Peril.")

Comments

[kiramartin.livejournal.com]

Or we could switch the words... "another planet", "left for another life",

"tween h-ll" (for those of you who have tweens), "moody" , or "strawberry fields"...the list could go on.

[gwyneira.livejournal.com]

That's hilarious - I'd love one too. I do feel that it should include the "Mortal Peril" setting, though, if only for authenticity. :)

[http://users.livejournal.com/anam_cara_/]

Looks like something you could make with the kidlets with a paper plate and those wooden popsicle stick/spoons and a couple of digital photos.

We actually use something similar with trying to find people that have stepped out of their office or that have an office and a lab in separate places, it looks like a pie chart with cute pictures or clipart representing each place and a dial that is attached with a brass clippy thing.

[http://users.livejournal.com/anam_cara_/]

Ew. I just looked at the picture when I made that comment- but then I read part of the article- does that clock work by GPS???? On the one hand, as a protective mom I get it, but on the other hand, I don't want to be that paranoid. Ever. I just thought it was a novelty thing that people walked up and moved their dial before leaving.

I agree with you though, that it's just cute for the HP factor.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

I want it also to say "Mortal Peril."

[callunav.livejournal.com]

The whole get-a-GPS-surgically-implanted-in-your-child trend creeps me out. (I didn't follow your link yet, I'm tangenting off your post and may not be truly relevant at all.)

I suppose this is at least in part because I do not yet have children, and so respond to this more from a retrospective child's point of view than from a parent's. I keep thinking, though, how invasive the technologies I've seen seem, and also how inadequate and potentially counter-productive: it would help for abductions, but not for run-a-ways or other kinds of misbehaviors: I'd think kids would learn damn fast to ditch their kiddie cell phone or whatever it is when they want to do something illicit, and the attempt to track, rather than rely on communication, would destroy trust.

I suppose, with abduction a real concern, I could see it - and I could imagine myself making a deal with the kid in which I showed them how to turn off the GPS and told them they were allowed to - but that afterwards they should tell me what had been going on that they felt the need to.

I don't know. Maybe if I'd had threats in my childhood greater than my parents themselves, I'd be less disturbed. :P