"Ryan Ginstrom" <ryang@TINNED.MEATgol.com> wrote in message 
news:30ioslF2ubhaoU1@uni-berlin.de...
>
> "mr.sumo.snr." <llanelli14@SPAMSUCKBANANAS.yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:30hb0eF30i51nU1@uni-berlin.de...
>> If I discovered one of my young students had their own mobile telephone -
>> for use other than to call and let their mother know when to pick them up
>> from an after-school activity, I could well imagine myself discussing the
>> matter with my wife using expressions such as "little madam", "spoilt
> brat"
>> or even stronger language reserved strictly for adults.
>
> In defense of these keitai-toting tots (my kid isn't one of them BTW) --  
> or
> rather the parents who so equip them -- if my 10 year-old kid was 
> commuting
> to and from school an hour each way, I would want it to have a keitai.
> Actually I would want to nix that commute, but so many parents are
> unwilling/unable to do so; the keitai is better than nothing.
>

I think kids' personal keitai are a great idea and will probably be a 
reality by the time sumo.jnr is entering grade school.  I wonder which of 
the major carriers why try hardest NOT to be seen to be profiteering from 
this tragedy by offering low-cost, GPS-enabled devices.  Every kid has a 
handkerchief, a packet of tissues, three pencils, a sharpener and an eraser. 
A telephone card, an umbrella and the same style, built to withstand an 
erupting volcano, schoolbag.  So why not a subcutaneous electronic location 
device - inserted at birth?

One thing kids round here would immediately benefit from is being allowed to 
wear a wrist-watch so they might be more aware of just how long they're been 
dawdling on their way home from school.

--
jonathan