TimesUpKidz Blog
September 2, 2008
Video games on the school bus
Our boys ride the bus to school.
Last year, nearly all the kids on the bus played their Nintendo Gameboys there
and back, for a total of about 90 minutes of video game time per day. We decided
that it wasn't in our kids best interest to start the day with a jolt of
electronics, and witheld their game systems that were "officially" only for use
on airplane rides. Many days our kids would get off the bus and complain about
how it wasn't fair that they couldn't play video games with all the other kids.
They were upset and felt socially isolated. So we worked with the school
administration to change their policy. We wanted the game systems banned
entirely, thinking it was best for the kids to talk, tell jokes, read, or just
stare out the window. But this was too big a step, politically, for the school
administration. They did change the official policy, however. Now the policy is
that kids can't play video games on the way to school, but they can play them on the
way home. We softened a bit, and now - school started today - we let our
kids play their video games with the other kids on the way home. Seems like a
reasonable compromise.
August 29, 2008
Making Google angry
I advertise TimesUpKidz on Google. Here's how it works. I "buy" keywords that
people search for. So if you search on Google for "computer time limits" or
"internet timer" or "computer timer" or some other relevant phrase, my ad will
show up on the page. And if you click on it, I pay a small fee - around 20 cents
- to Google. Well today I did something really really stupid. I bought a keyword
that had absolutely nothing to do with my software, but which I knew a lot of
people would be searching for that particular day. Out of shame I won't divulge
the keyword here. But what I did was analogous to buying the keyword "Sarah
Palin" on the day the Republicans announced their vice-presidential candidate.
Within just one hour my ad was shown 117,000 times. 64 people clicked on it,
which is only .05% of the total number of ad impressions, and not a single
person downloaded the software. So I turned off this disastrous keyword. But it
was too late. Google's computers noticed something was awry, and decided to
penalize my entire advertising campaign. Suddenly all my reasonable keywords,
like "limit kids computer time", were rated "poor" by Google and would cost me
$10.00 per click. Since then the cost of my keywords has steadily decreased, but
I have had to pay $5.00 per click on some keywords - even "TimesUpKidz" - and my
ad campaign hasn't completely recovered. I've learned my lesson.
August 28, 2008
The 30-day free trial that lasts forever
Today someone emailed me to say that his free trial of TimesUpKidz seemed "stuck"
showing that he had 30 days left. So I investigated the problem and discovered,
to my horror and embarassment, that the free trial does last forever on Windows
XP. It worked fine on Windows Vista, however, which is the platform upon which I
had done most of my testing. Perhaps that explains why there were a handful of customers
raving about how great the software was - who still hadn't gotten around to
paying for it.
August 14, 2008
Wily teenager
I got an email from a customer that said "hi. ive tried this and i don't
like it can you tell me how to un-install this please if you do ill be greatful."
So I explained how to uninstall the program and asked the person what they didn't
like about the software. Here was the response "yeah my mum set it and i hate
it so i asked how to delete it." Unfortunately (for her) only parents can uninstall
TimesUpKidz. TimesUpKidz uses the security built into Windows and only administrators
of the computer can bypass the time limits, change the computer's clock, and
uninstall the program.
June 21, 2008
Do you have trouble restricting your own computer time?
My wife jokes that our kids strongest memory of their parents will be of us sitting
in front of our computers. Sad, but true. I got a customer support email from someone
who had trouble getting the software to work. Here's what they wrote:
"Ok, I will be honest. I am the one that needs my time monitored on the computer.
So I set up the software and the limits but it put me as the parent. When I tried
to make changes it said I had to change my administrative powers. Well I can't
do that, because I do a lot of things that I need full access to do. So how can
I use the TimesUpKidz for myself. PS. I am the only one who uses the computer."
One of the most effective ways to help our kids spend less time with video games
is for us (as parents) to spend more time reading, taking walks, relaxing, playing
music and board games, etc. The less time we spend hunched in front of the computer
browsing the internet, the less exciting this activity will seem to our kids.
Easier said than done.