Dear Friends and Students
Today I am reading an interesting & intriguing article written by Madhav Chanchani in TheCaptable. Mobile game addiction is not just a Social Menace but it has a significant impact on Loneliness, Social Anxiety, and Depression. Indian Govt. banned PUBG last year, but still, we have 14.8 million people playing active!! Of course, it is lower than last year's lockdown number (33-34 million during June 2020) but this number is also alarming!! What is the core fundamental issue? How do we combat this menace? Before this, let’s see the little history of video games!
The first commercial video games are released in 1970, soon, in the 1980s this obsession is known as “Space Invaders obsession' and 'Computer Catatonia’. In the 1990s, home gaming consoles gain popularity. For the first time, it was found that a video game produces Dopamine (chemical messenger or “feel-good” hormone) in the human brain!! In 2000, online and mobile games emerged. From here, the addiction levels are started increasing. In 2013, it is proved that addiction is a psychological disorder. Today in few cases, it is becoming a social issue as well.
It is also found that each player spends on average 60-80 minutes per day. In spite of the ban on few games like PUBG, people are going through alternative routes (VPN, Using TapTap, PUBG APK) to download and play!! People are downloading non-English versions to avoid restrictions. Just to give you the perspective, during March 2020, PUBG had 30 million active users from India alone and 3.71 billion minutes were spent on this game. India is the second-largest market after China! Now you can imagine the kind of gravity of the problem. During Sep 2020, numbers got increased to 34 million. This is the time Govt. of India announced the ban.
Now many teenagers are going for Free Fire (attracted to the more colorful avatars, (18-19 million daily active users in India)), the ultimate survival shooter game available on mobile. It is generating $10-12 million a month!!
Dear Parent
What does it mean to you? It means you as a parent, are spending that much amount on your kids entertainment!! Govt. cannot do much and prevent as children started using alternative VPNs to download them. We require moral policing!
Today we don’t have a grandparents network to prevent these deviations. Grandparents do a lot of moral policing and bring better awareness than parents as kids tend to be closer to grandparents. Before we lose the ground, joint family systems seem to be one good option!! If it is not feasible, you should find an alternative ground.
Raise!
Your Well-wisher
Ravi Saripalle
Join Inspire to Innovate Storytelling Movement (i2itm.blogspot.com)
Source Inspiration: https://the-captable.com/2021/04/ban-pubg-14-million-users-krafton-tencent-freefire-china-gaming-1/
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