Foundation Nation
Foundation Nation
S4 - E12: Nostalgia, Innovation, and Protecting Childhood in the Digital Age.
We're cracking open Cherry Cokes and swapping stories—from Jay's festive video creations to musings about the latest in film. Revel in our anticipation for a new masterpiece from Japanese animator Miyazaki, and hear us cackle over "Dawn of the Nugget," the much-awaited "Chicken Run" sequel. Plus, we're spilling our thoughts on the perceived shifts in safety, as we contrast the statistics with the sentiments on today's playgrounds.
As the conversation turns, we delve into the digital realm where the lines between virtual and reality blur, particularly for our kids. The recent Roblox lawsuit has us unraveling the complexities of online gaming safety, prompting us to share how we navigate parental controls and the digital guidance we impart to our own children. We're also peeling back the layers on how the content of video games can influence young minds, just as much as other adult behaviors. Listen in as we advocate for a more vigilant approach to gifting, emphasizing the significance of knowing what kind of entertainment we're placing into the hands of the next generation—a heartfelt reminder for parents and anyone playing a part in a child's life.
Hello and welcome to Foundation Nation. I'm your host, matthew Cote. Today on the podcast, we're going to talk about some interesting recent goings-ons in our beautiful state and maybe even a few things going on in this amazing round thing we call home. Hello, I'm Matthew Cote and this is Foundation Nation, along with Tech Genius Jay.
Speaker 2:Hi, my name is Jay Solmi, owner of Jay's Technology Solutions. So let's start the frivolity Matt.
Speaker 1:All right, all right. So what I'm going to do first is I'm going to open up some cherry coke. Let's see if it'll pick it up. Of course it will. Did you hear that? Yeah, Tuesday season? Yeah, cherry coke. All right, I'm going to drink it so fast and I'm going to know what happened. So what's been going on with you? It's the holiday season. What do you got going on?
Speaker 2:It is Well, we talked last time about the holiday scene underneath our tree. Yeah, we're ready to do the first recording video of it, with it all running and moving, and put it on my Facebook page.
Speaker 1:So this weekend maybe? Yes, yes, nice. So has your kid seen it do its thing yet, of course, he's helped us build the whole thing, so you don't have a great reveal for him. No, he's working on it all the way through.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, he's nine, so his participation is dependent on squirrel Squirrel.
Speaker 1:Yeah, shiny, shiny, shiny outfit yeah.
Speaker 2:So there's a basketball Mm-hmm, you know. And then when our neighbor says we can use his whoop any time we want, as long as there's no cars in the driveway, yeah, that's nice. Well, now he's got reason to go outside more. Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's kind of weird. I mean, you know how? I don't know how it was for you, but in my neighborhood there was basically kids outside 24-7. You know, nowadays I don't see kids out in the roads no, hardly at all. They're all doing other things now.
Speaker 2:No, kids nowadays doesn't know what it means to be playing and go car yeah, and then have to get out of the way and let the car pass and go back in the street and keep playing. Yeah, kids don't play in the street anymore.
Speaker 1:You know, I think we're going back to the beginning of time. We're all hiding in our caves and we're afraid a dinosaur is going to eat us. I actually read an article on Wall Street Journal a couple of weeks ago maybe a month now and they said that United States is the safest place it's ever been since the history of the United States. Right now, yet, people seem to be scared more than ever. Is the safest? It's the safest it's been since the creation of the United States as a body. You know.
Speaker 1:What do you think I?
Speaker 2:have a hard time with that one. Yeah, based on how, like you said, people are scared, can't even drive down the road without worrying about if someone's going to pull a gun out or run you off the road.
Speaker 1:People are nervous. You know, I don't know what it. Maybe it's all that free weed, you know the legal weed, or something making everybody nervous Racks.
Speaker 2:But it feels pretty safe. Oh, it's flower power again.
Speaker 1:Are we going back to flower power? Oh jeez, sorry. Moving on, moving on, all right. So we got a couple of cool movies coming up. I'm really kind of excited about them.
Speaker 1:So Myazaki came out with a movie and it seems like it's you know all. Have you seen any of his movies, the Myazaki movies? Not that I'm aware of. So he did like Castle in the Sky and stuff like that. So he's a Japanese animator, just really kind of interesting films that are kind of.
Speaker 1:They're kind of poetic and fun to watch, but really off the hook, you know, kind of like, like they said, the Castle in the Sky is about this kid that goes to, you know, essentially a city that's floating in the sky and they have another one where these, this, this, this boy and his mom and dad have to move for their job, and it's all in Japan, you know, in Japanese, and then they do subtitles kind of thing, and it's he, the, the parents go eating this food and they start eating this food and then they start eating and eating.
Speaker 1:Slowly. The parents transform into pigs and then they go work on a pig farm, you know, or whatever, and the kid ends up working in a steam house, a bath house down in the bottom working the coal to power the steam engines, to power the steam house up above. Anyway, really interesting movies. You should check them out. They're all in Disney and you should check them out though, because they're some of them but they're all kid-appropriate, you know, and but they're very fantastical. You know, they're kind of like that, that, that Harry Potter kind of takeoff movie. You know, the Fantastic Beasts or something like that. It's kind of like that, but cartoon version.
Speaker 2:Huh, if you've seen that, yeah, that's the Fantastic Beasts.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so and it's, it's, it's entertaining, you know, for sure, very original ideas, this Miyazaki stuff. But there's another movie coming out. You've seen Chicken Run? Yes, uh-huh. This one's called Dawn of the Nugget, dawn of the Nugget.
Speaker 2:yes, If I remember correctly, this is where they need to break back in to a chicken farm.
Speaker 1:Ha? They got to break into a chicken farm. Why are they going to do that? Save all the chickens.
Speaker 2:Save the child. If I remember right, the child gets fantasized by being on a chicken farm about how happy it's going to be. Oh, ok, and then the hero from the last one. I can't remember the name right now. Right, they get their crew together and break in to break out. Break in to break out.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, all those chicken movies are pretty funny. Chickens in general are pretty funny. What's your guys' favorite? Do you guys have a holiday, or Christmas or Hanukkah? Do you have a funny movie that you guys watch? This time here.
Speaker 2:Well, there's lots of good ones. We're going to try to see if Jameson can handle a Christmas story.
Speaker 1:Christmas story yeah, ok, yeah.
Speaker 2:So we'll see how he likes that one this year. We've done it before, but he's been younger, but Jameson's really like in the animated Grinch that came out just a few years ago.
Speaker 1:Oh, ok, yeah, that's great. Yeah, you know what I just watched by accident. Adam Sandler, about in the mid-90s, came up with a movie. It's an animation of him and he's like a grumpy guy during Christmas. It's an animation and he's all the voices in it. That sounds familiar. Yeah, and I've never seen it before. I only watched about half of it and then I fell asleep on the couch but I was trying to watch it. It was pretty funny. You know, it's normal gross dorky or his humor, it's just normal humor stuff, but it was pretty interesting. I never saw it, but mine is Home Alone and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:I save it for Christmas morning and rear yeah, Yep, yeah. That's a good one too, Of course, when you bring up Adam Sandler. All I can ever think of is the Hanukkah song with eight crazy nights, oh yeah.
Speaker 3:God damn, that's funny so at any time.
Speaker 2:Adam Sandler and Christmas time. Of course it's Hanukkah, which is fantastic. That's all I think of is his song of Eight Crazy Nights. Yeah, yeah, If you actually put on the Disney holiday playlist, they have one by David Dogs that's called Puppy for Hanukkah. Puppy for Hanukkah yeah, that's a cute one, that's a fun song.
Speaker 3:Foundation Nation is proudly sponsored by Jace Technology Solutions. Call Jace Technology Solutions at 253-376-7579 for all your computer repair, it and network solutions.
Speaker 1:Eight Crazy Nights. That's the one where he's sitting on a chair. I don't remember.
Speaker 2:And singing. I hear it.
Speaker 1:Where's the one where he's sitting on the chair singing oh Hanukkah?
Speaker 2:I haven't. It sounds familiar, but I don't recall at the moment.
Speaker 1:Hanukkah song, Adam Sandler. Jeez, where is it? Oh, it's a Chanukkana song or whatever. Let me see if I can pull this up here. Hold on.
Speaker 2:We're going to sing a song right now. You might know the words too, so if you ask me, I'll say it. Let's get started. Hold on to Yamaka. It's time for Hanaka. So much Hanaka, to say it all back. Hanaka.
Speaker 1:Hanaka is the vegetable of life.
Speaker 2:Instead of one day of presents, we get eight crazy nights.
Speaker 1:That's pretty funny, though there's eight crazy nights. Yeah, eight crazy nights. Yeah, that's the one. Yeah, so Christmas, fun time of year, fun time of year. What are some of the? Do you have any early memories?
Speaker 2:Early memories.
Speaker 2:Like that blew your mind. The early memories I have is when I lived with my mom and dad in Massachusetts and dad was in the Army and on base there. Where we lived, we had, I want to say it's around six or eight two-story homes, you know, apartments, tunnels, whatever you want to call them. They're all connected to each other. And as we were coming up on Christmas well, anyone, who's these coats? You know we had snow for months. Washingtonians, I'm sorry, Washingtonians, you can hate me if you want, but you don't know what snow is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're getting blasted this week too. Yeah, and you know, we had snow forever and I remember this. One year I was playing and then all of a sudden, I got called to the living room and there was a whole bunch of people over. Because you know, that's what you did on base right, you all went to someone else's house and there was Santa. Oh really, yeah, right there in our living room. This was actually our house. You know, it wasn't at someone else's. It was so amazing and kids got to sit on his lap. Holy crap, it was absolutely amazing. And I think that year I got the igloo maker.
Speaker 1:You ever get one of those. Yeah, it's like a little clamp thing.
Speaker 2:Just a rectangle box with a handle on it, packed snow in it and then put it down like brick makes a brick. Yeah Right, and I remember that year all of us got together, kids and adults, and in between the four complexes we built a massive igloo that we would go in. We could actually go in it. It was so much fun. That's cool.
Speaker 1:The beginning of your Lego situation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, basically I had Lego back then. You know, back then the Lego tracks were actual individual rails. Oh yeah, they weren't preformed into the size they are now in the Lego rail. I think it was a little bit longer than the straight track. Yeah, and you actually had to get your own plates and bricks and space them correctly and put it. Yeah, they come a long way. Yeah, they made it for some things. They made it too easy for us to put together.
Speaker 1:Well, when they come. That's what I really don't like is they come now in the individual packs, one through whatever you know. Pack one, pack two, pack three. That's not how I played with them.
Speaker 2:No, they came in a jumbled ass box and you just pour it out and shit flies everywhere and hopefully you can lose one 3,000 pieces and you don't have them in individual bags, so you start with this one and then go to this one, you pour it all into a big box or on the floor and had fun. Yeah, have them. Forbid if you had a dog or a cat or a thick carpet.
Speaker 1:Oh yes, the one by ones are gone. Yes, yes, the little studs.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:They just burrow away. Yeah, so what? Let's see what do we got going on? We got some techy stuff going on.
Speaker 2:Yes you wanted to talk about, oh, Christmas time and all the presents, Roblox.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, you brought up that article yeah, yeah, basically there's a lawsuit. This article is really interesting because I'm always my boys are old and stuff and they've moved on from having to worry about this. A lot of people have little guys still and little girls and this is a lawsuit that claims that roadblocks is failing to protect the kids. You know, in a couple of different ways. What do you think about that?
Speaker 2:Well, I have a nine year old. Yeah, is he playing this game? He has Roblox, oh shit. And this is all about opinions on this show, right? Yeah, of course it's about our own personal thoughts and opinions. So my thought on Roblox, on Minecraft, on online gaming, on anything, is it goes back to the parents. Yeah, the parents are responsible for raising their own children. I know this may be a shock to some people. Ok, so would you? So the lawsuit is that Roblox is to blame. I set up our son's Roblox account. There's parental controls, oh so, and you can lock him out of all these different things.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the things that you would be scared that he would be on on that? I've never played that game.
Speaker 2:The lawsuit. Specifically was talked about one item where a girl was playing in the game, because there's so many different things you can do. The girl went into just a bathroom on the game right, not in real life In the video game went into the bathroom and someone was in there and asked her to take off her pants.
Speaker 1:So hold on. So Back up a second the chat. What is this? What am I? I'm looking at this game. What am I looking at? I don't even know what this shit. For some reason I thought it was a car racing game. No, no. So can you describe the screen to me.
Speaker 2:I look at it very rarely, but basically you're running around collecting and doing different things.
Speaker 1:So you see your hands, your whole little body.
Speaker 2:No, it's just a made up animated character that you can?
Speaker 1:Is it more advanced than, say, minecraft? Or does it look blocky like that, or is it? No, it's kind of blocky. Ok, so it's blocky little characters running around in a real world, kind of deal.
Speaker 2:In a fake real world type thing. Yeah, OK, all right.
Speaker 1:OK, OK.
Speaker 2:So it's just in the chat. The chat is where you can turn off the ability to talk with others. Ok, and if you don't set it up correctly and, being in technology, if you don't set things up correctly, they don't work right, right, or they do too much that you don't want them to do Right, right. So I understand the lawsuit. Yes, there needs to be provisions, but when I set up our son's account, there's those blocks for that. He can only chat with people that he's allowed to be friends with, right? No, like Facebook, you have friends.
Speaker 1:Oh, so he has to have friends, friends that you guys are familiar with, and approve, and approve, and those are the ones he can chat with. Yes, ok, well, that's great, right, that's great.
Speaker 2:But it's the parents that don't realize this or don't care, or whatever the situation may be Right and they go, oh yeah, go ahead and set one up. And they set one up as if they're an adult and they can do anything and everything and talk to anyone in their program.
Speaker 1:OK. So here I'll ask. Here we go. So, nine-year-old Jameson, he can play roadblocks, yes. Can he play the Playboy video game, no, ok. So if another parent said their nine-year-old could play the Playboy video game, what would you say?
Speaker 2:I question their parenting skills. Yeah, me too.
Speaker 1:Me too. Do people really understand what's going on in these internet, in these video game situations? Now, they're pretty hardcore.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but unfortunately at this day and age, the people with the kids are playing the games themselves and they don't see a problem. Yeah, yeah. So if you grow up being an alcoholic and your child starts drinking, you don't see a problem because you do the same thing.
Speaker 1:Right. So for Christmas, if you're getting video games or devices that play video games or devices that are just video games, you just got to be mindful and aware of what you're giving them and what the controls are. Ok, all right. Well, that was an interesting conversation. I think that I'm going to think more about that when I give gifts out for Christmas to other people. Maybe I'll just give them posters, all right. Well, I'm Matthew Cote and this has been a great episode of Foundation Nation.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much, matt. It's been a pleasure, as always.
Speaker 1:All right, you guys have a good day and we'll catch you on the flip side.
Speaker 3:Foundation Nation is proudly sponsored by Jace Technology Solutions. Call Jace Technology Solutions at 253-376-7579 for all your computer repair, it and network solutions.
