Tuesday, March 30, 2010

More On South Korean Gaming

CNN.com has yet another story on Korea's Internert addiction. 

I'm still not sure where I stand on this issue. While I think Internet addiction is very real, I wonder how much of it exists here, as opposed to any other country. I mean, is it more than other countries? Most importantly, I'm too lazy to look up any statistics.

But this issue gets a lot of coverage because of the tragedies that come from it. From the story:

'Some recent extreme cases of Internet addiction have made for some shocking headlines: Earlier this month a three-month-old baby girl succumbed to malnutrition while her parents spent 12-hour stretches in an Internet café playing the role-playing game Prius Online, police said.

In another tragedy last month, officials said a 22-year-old man returned to an Internet cafe to continue playing immediately after he murdered his mother, who had complained about his gaming habits. Physical exhaustion after long computer sessions has also caused deaths.'
I get it. In these cases, certainly an addiction looks to be at play. Of course, maybe these people were simply nuts in the first place.



The story mentions the 25,000 PC bangs giving kids unlimited, 24/7 access to kids even -- or maybe especially -- when they're outside of the home. What's funny is that the story mentions a price tag of about $1.10 per hour. Well, the PC bang in my building has a price of ... wait for it ... 44 cents per hour!

The government has a bunch of programs they're already using and even more in the works. My advice would be to introduce them to a more addictive substance at an earlier age to counteract the Internet addiction. But what could they use??? I have it: Soju!!!

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