Feels like an interesting trend where a "solution" for parent anxiety (and to be fair, vastly increased societal expectations around what "care" looks like) is proposed to be electronic surveillance.
It's a kid tracker / ankle bracelet in an attractive form factor.
I was a kid in the 80s, city fringe, single parent who worked until 5:30. Honestly nobody had any idea where me & my friends were a lot of the time. Totally acceptable in that era.
The main worry I have about tech like this is, at what saturation of deployment does the norm shift such that it's irresponsible NOT to electronically track your kids whenever they leave the house?
Or its a phone alternative for younger kids that keeps an actual phone out of their hands, allows for worry free communication while they roam the streets and is backed by arguably the most privacy focused of the big tech companies…
(disclosure: my 8 and 10 year old have them, works great for everyone involved)
I’m not saying your conclusion is incorrect but the anecdote provided is survivorship bias. My childhood was much the same in the 90s.
There was a case recently where parents were charged with felony involuntary manslaughter, and felony child neglect because they let their 10 and 7 year cross the street unsupervised and a car hit them and the 7 year old died. As a parent if that’s the reality I definitely hesitate to allow my son out unsupervised when he’s a bit older. I can’t imagine losing your son in an accident and then have the state come down on you while you’re still grieving.
This is a fantastic option when the only other viable option is to get them a phone. They can text parents, they can be tracked, but they can’t watch stupid YouTube or TikTok videos, and they can’t participate in 95% of the stuff that harms kids at that age.
What’s become the “irresponsible norm” is to not give your kids a phone, which is crazy, because it’s just giving tech companies the ability to manipulate kids.
Honestly—I think this is a great marketing angle for Apple. (And if they didn't want to risk cannibalizing iPhone sales they could also spin it as an anti-phone addiction measure for adults as well!) More and more I'm starting to feel comfortable leaving my phone at home and using just my cellular Watch + AirPods when I'm out and about.
I'd like to see regulators deal with the bundling requirements for devices. It would serve the greater good by preventing a company the size of Apple from obligating that someone must buy an iPhone to use an Apple Watch.
I don't know what kind of games you could fit on a watch (Tamagotchi type things?), but getting kids to actually use things requires them seeing some sort of direct reward.
We bought cheapo dumb phones for our kids and they'd never remember to take them with them, but once we were forced to get them smart phones suddenly that was never a problem.
And by forced I mean the endless wearing down of the whining and crying and petulance because all their friends had smartphones. Ugh, one of many occasions where I failed as a parent.
It's a kid tracker / ankle bracelet in an attractive form factor.
I was a kid in the 80s, city fringe, single parent who worked until 5:30. Honestly nobody had any idea where me & my friends were a lot of the time. Totally acceptable in that era.
The main worry I have about tech like this is, at what saturation of deployment does the norm shift such that it's irresponsible NOT to electronically track your kids whenever they leave the house?
(disclosure: my 8 and 10 year old have them, works great for everyone involved)
There was a case recently where parents were charged with felony involuntary manslaughter, and felony child neglect because they let their 10 and 7 year cross the street unsupervised and a car hit them and the 7 year old died. As a parent if that’s the reality I definitely hesitate to allow my son out unsupervised when he’s a bit older. I can’t imagine losing your son in an accident and then have the state come down on you while you’re still grieving.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/06/opinion/children-traffic-...
What’s become the “irresponsible norm” is to not give your kids a phone, which is crazy, because it’s just giving tech companies the ability to manipulate kids.
We bought cheapo dumb phones for our kids and they'd never remember to take them with them, but once we were forced to get them smart phones suddenly that was never a problem.
And by forced I mean the endless wearing down of the whining and crying and petulance because all their friends had smartphones. Ugh, one of many occasions where I failed as a parent.