One can imagine ‘good’ versions of all this tech, but right now it doesn’t exist. It seems crazy that it doesn’t exist? Shouldn’t someone sell it? Properly curated experiences that gave parents proper control and steered children in good ways seem super doable, and would have a very large market with high willingness to pay.
I’m having problems imagining the ‘good’ version because I can’t imagine the business model working: you are competing with free. People round “free with externalities” to free, and see that as preferable to “paid for in a way that aligns incentives”. The existence of a “free” option causes people to anchor and anchor hard that the value of a thing isn’t worth paying for. People tend to not open their pockets for physical intangibles.
The only way I can imagine this working somehow is to try to copy how cosmetic micropayments exploit local social status; tying paying by parents into a social proof game among parents. But that just moves the unhealthy externalities away from the children (which is at least something), and once the social hierarchy where You Must Pay To Be A Good Parent is established, there’s nothing preventing Goodhart from turning the whole system into CocoMelon 2 But This Time You’re Directly Paying Us.
I’m having problems imagining the ‘good’ version because I can’t imagine the business model working: you are competing with free. People round “free with externalities” to free, and see that as preferable to “paid for in a way that aligns incentives”. The existence of a “free” option causes people to anchor and anchor hard that the value of a thing isn’t worth paying for. People tend to not open their pockets for physical intangibles.
The only way I can imagine this working somehow is to try to copy how cosmetic micropayments exploit local social status; tying paying by parents into a social proof game among parents. But that just moves the unhealthy externalities away from the children (which is at least something), and once the social hierarchy where You Must Pay To Be A Good Parent is established, there’s nothing preventing Goodhart from turning the whole system into CocoMelon 2 But This Time You’re Directly Paying Us.