News Flash: 13-year-olds Can Text Quickly

Does anyone else have a problem with this. We are rewarding a child for wasting time getting good at a useless skill. There has never and will never be a time when this will save a life or even make anyone learn something. Why don't we invest this money into some who will use a gift for the good of ... something like science. Maybe that money could go to cancer or alzheimers research.

Video game playing is that wasting time

some people go on to make lots of money

doin that.What about sport

Wanted, High speed texter, must be familiar with student idioms, $100,000 + stock options.

Much like...

Wanted Atari player, must reach level 10 in 2 minutes.

in the 80's

The problem is by the time these kids reach the real working environment, they will have severe problems with hand movements due to things like carpel tunnel syn and tendinitis. A lot of us already have these problems, and texting and video games weren't even around when we grew up.

I agree, its a very big problem. I went to a Sabres game a month ago, and the girl sitting in front of me "texted" the entire game. I don't think she looked up once. Couldn't fight the urge to text (not even a 5 min break) even though she is paying money for the seat. Was this contest sponsered by one of the service providers?

I'd say it's a problem too. Curious note, if she won $25k in a couple seconds texting, I wonder how long it will take her to spend it texting? Consumer craze and salesperson gimmicks are such a waste of natural resources it makes me sick. The only bonus of this crap is that I can go to Spark Fun and buy a cellular module capable of audio and data transfer for about a $150 and integrate it into a remote sensor for long distance wireless data transfer. That certainly wasn't possible before the days of 'selling the cell phone to teens.' Not a justification, just trying to find a glimps of silver lining. My concern is that if/when I have kids I can convince them that they don't need that stuff; unless they become nerds and disect their friends' used Nokias for the LCD and CCD cam to use in thier science fair projects! :-) My big concern is the parents giving thier kids thier own DVD players, cell phones and gameboys to get them to shut up; technology doesn't make a good baby sitter.

To each thier own I guess.