Melinda Gates (think Bill & Microsoft) wrote a perspective in the Washington Post that she & Bill “don’t allow cellphones at the dinner table” which lead to “amazing conversation.” The August 24, 2017 perspective is entitled “Melinda Gates: I spent my career in technology. I wasn’t prepared for its effect on my kids” and included this background:
I spent my career at Microsoft trying to imagine what technology could do, and still I wasn’t prepared for smartphones and social media.
Like many parents with children my kids’ age, I didn’t understand how they would transform the way my kids grew up — and the way I wanted to parent.
I’m still trying to catch up.
The pace of change is what amazes me the most.
The challenges my younger daughter will be facing when she starts high school in the fall are light-years away from what my elder daughter, who’s now in college, experienced in 2010.
My younger daughter’s friends live a lot of their lives through filters on Instagram and Snapchat, two apps that didn’t even exist when my elder daughter was dipping a toe in social media.
Gates applauded the January 2017 French law allowing employees the “Right to Disconnect” after work hours.