• @biggerbogboy
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    621 days ago

    As a 17 year old who has 3 phones (somewhat strange story behind it), giving a child a phone should be either when they need it, such as when they go out more often or other events where they need a specific use, but if not, I believe 18 to 20 is not a bad age to receive one, since young adults are more likely to need to travel to schooling such as UNI more often and generally need more info about travel routes and to be able to message parents/siblings/etc.

    As for my 3 phones, one is a galaxy S4 my dad gave me as a hand-me-down, pretty much used to text my parents exclusively, then I received an oppo Reno z from a friend who didn’t need it, which I currently use as a games and social media phone, then the third is one is a galaxy a20 my dad brought home and said I could take if I wanted, since there were a few of those unused at his workplace, so I now just use that as a flashlight.

    • @[email protected]
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      521 days ago

      You can’t exist in this world without a phone anymore.
      Any meaningful school relationship builds on things like messaging groups.
      Just because we could do it in the early 2000s doesnt mean it’s applicable today.

      This would today socially cripple a student.

      • @biggerbogboy
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        217 days ago

        I guess it lands differently in other parts of the world and is more nuanced than I previously anticipated, since, where I live we are quite agnostic between devices to message with, some use phones, some use tablets, some use laptops, and it goes on. As for my friend group, none of us communicated using phones until mid 2022, two years into our friendships.

        Since we all moved to our senior campus, we are just now emphasising smartphones as a daily method of communication, compared to our previous default, laptops and desktops, but we normally use the same apps/sites we used to, specifically discord and Instagram.

        Again, I believe it depends on the area, maybe in other parts they use phones much more often compared to us, or some may never use phones at all.

        • @[email protected]
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          217 days ago

          Oh certainly!
          I would say my take would more or less apply to most of west Europe and north America and maybe some parts of heavily urbanized parts of Asia. But that is only guessing.
          My location is in Germany so take that information for what it is :)

          • @biggerbogboy
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            117 days ago

            I definitely agree, though I’d also add the Australia/New Zealand region as well, since we are also reasonably heavy users of phones too. Also I’m from Victoria, Australia by the way, it’s pretty fascinating how diverse the internet is :)