Pokemon Go! A generation lost in 1 day....

Jamie Stick wrote:

MartaLina wrote: Please be carefull out there , dont hurt anyone or yourself because of a game please , thank you , on behalf of the people who live and play in the real world , please ?

Not to say people shouldn't be careful, but you do realize that two of the three links you provided were satire, right? The video you showed was actually a dude being semi-responsible having his friend drive while he caught pokemon.

No i did not , thanks for pointing that out, but in the video they almost hit someone ?

:blink: :laugh:

As for getting one "on their feet" and "out of the house" -- geocaching does that too, but one is looking at real things for real things ...

... a good walk would do that too.

As as for Ethan's reference to the Star Trek : The Next Generation episode The Game, well, that was spot on. It may not be an "alien" civilisation invading, but that is how these addictive games work (in other words, why we enjoy this stupid crap and can't put it down) -- they stimulate pleasure - risk/reward - centres of our brains and we get our own brain-drugs going (sort of how we aren't very reasonable when we're in love).

So, yes -- we can in fact cast a suspicious look at the game developers, not just the ones who get addicted to them. If I sell you and all your friends a perfectly legal, yet highly addictive, drug in a cute package and then you get addicted to it (with all the consequences of that addiction manifesting), then it would be hard to defend myself saying : "It's a perfectly reasonable product ; they are just using it wrong" or "they have no will-power."

Libertarians really need therapy ... :dry:

I have no leanings either way about Pokémon or Pokémon Go. As paid employees the responsibility falls to each of us to manage our time and what we deliver at work. If folks aren't mature enough to keep their distractions in check (whatever they may be) during business hours...they'll likely end up with a lot more free time to indulge themselves.

With a day or two under my belt. My husband and brother in law are coming back from there work with two reports.

1. Almost everyone there is playing Pokemon Go. In fact, their work sign is a Poke shop so it is quickly becoming the new break/smoke spot for these player.

and

2. No one is losing their job or being effected by the game when its time to work.

Tell ya what though.... It drains battery life something fierce >_<

In terms of Things Society Collectively Loses Its Mind Over™, video games are just the latest entry. In every generation, there is something of which someone claims, "oh em gee, we've lost a whole generation in one day" — a new technology to blame all of that era's ills on. Where do I start?



(massive h/t to the Pessimists Archive ... speaking of which )

Life will go on. Things will be fine. Also, in response to the "why not just go geocaching" part: I am a geocacher. I love geocaching. But just about every geocacher I know who has kids has had a hard time getting their kids interested in the hobby because it is, for a kid, kind of boring. Pokemon Go, for all its supposed faults, doesn't seem to have that problem, at least.

Im always surprised by how surprised I am how negative people are initially to anything new, but especially technology.

In my opinion, people who cant control themselves, well, a video game will not make or break that problem. Something will come up in regards to ones addictive personality.

Sure, you could just go for a walk, or whatever....Or, you can catch Pokemon.

One is not better or worse than the other, and really, no, a generation will not be lost in a day, more, I think it shows people of a certain age already getting to set in there ways.

The whole "Back in my day..." which well, back in my day none of this existed, but that is largely irrelevant to today.

Enjoy life.

Dont be scared of new things simply because they are new.

Dont be knee-jerk scared of technology.

Realize that the world you grew up in is not the world people are growing up in today.

At one time, people didnt bathe regularly, and some used there teeth as currency.

I swear, its as if people need to doom and gloom everything, even to the point where a Pokemon game is the cause of a world wide apocalypse.

If people want to escape their day to day surroundings so badly (or with so little provocation), maybe there's more at play here than a cute game that people like.

I know I wish I could quit my day job.

Everyone seems to be up and about to defend Pokemon Go … which is fine. I’d play it to if I had a compatible operating system and honestly, with all the time consuming nonsense out there a game making us walk is definitely one of the better things. However, I did not take Athena_Undomiels initial post out to be a prompt to discuss Pokemon go specifically but escapism and the general notion of “people who will walk away from their lives”. I did not take part to discredit Pokemon, I answered in regards to this sentence:

Athena_Undomiel wrote:

Why are we so quick to get away from the here and now?

Because really, this game is just one out of many, outstanding as it may be. Still from what I perceive (which might very well be faulty) there IS a general increase in people blatantly discarding more and more of their lives for another world. And from my own personal experience I can say that, at least for me, overindulgence comes at a hefty price.

And I still game, because just demonizing games and pretending they don’t exist won’t tackle the underlying problem: My desire to be somewhere, anywhere else.

Why is everything that takes up attention considered escapism?

What exactly do people mean by "the here and now."