If The Truth Fits

Microsoft matches reward for missing Canadian teen - A 15 year old Canadian boy named Brandon Crisp went missing on October 13th after his parents stopped him from playing on his Xbox 360, someone (it isn’t made clear who) put up a reward of $25,000 (Canadian) for infromation that will hopefully lead to finding Brandon, and Microsoft have offered to match the reward.

I don’t know why so many people hate Microsoft, people are always saying that they’re evil, and yet, I can’t really think of anything evil that they’ve done in the world of computing. Okay, I’ve never used Windows Vista, but how bad can that really be? Some people seem to think that Bill Gates is the devil incarnate, saying that all he wanted was to get money out of them and didn’t care about his products. They seem to forget where Bill comes from, the guy is a geek, I’m sure he would love it if he could push a product out of the door that was 100% perfect, but business and practicality gets in the way. And the money thing? Now that Bill has ’stepped back’ from working at Microsoft and stopped palling around with Jerry Seinfeld he’s dedicating a lot more of his time to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, y’know, the foundation he’s using to try and bring about an end to… pretty much all the problems in the world by the looks of it. He’s spending quite a large proportion of his astounding wealth on the Foundation, so I guess that even if you thought he was a money grabber, at least he’s doing some good with it.

Getting back to the story after that extended sidebar, obviously this is a pretty sad story, whenever a kid goes missing you worry, at that age you think you can take on the world but there’s a lot of danger out there and I hope that Brandon gets home safe soon, but at the same time… what kind of kid runs away because his parents stop him from playing on his Xbox? I know that when you’re 15 your mind isn’t all that focused, but I can’t quite follow the logic between these steps: I like playing on my Xbox, Mom and Dad won’t let me play on my Xbox… I’d better run away. Where does this kid expect to go from there with this, but hey, like I said, at that age you aren’t exactly thinking straight, and I’m sure that Brandon thinks he has good reasons.

The Reuters article that I found out about this story worried me somewhat, here’s a quote to help illustrate my point:

It is possible that police will ask or have already asked Microsoft to divulge the list of players with whom Brandon Crisp has played recently.

As online gaming has exploded in popularity since the start of the decade, academics and parents have raised concerns over the possibility of addiction.

Last year, the American Medical Association said more research was necessary on the potential of addiction to video games. It urged parents to closely monitor their children’s use of games and the Internet.

Web sites such as www.wowdetox.com, a sounding board for those addicted to or trying to quit the popular “World of Warcraft” online game, have sprung up as well.

So, the first part of that, about the police asking Microsoft for information, is quite clearly pure speculation, but it is being reported as a fact. The second part is again based upon speculation rather than fact. Parents concerns are not good evidence, and the suggestion of the American Medical Association doesn’t really mean anything either, they say it needs more study, and that parents should monitor their childrens gaming and internet usage, monitor it for what? When was there a suggestion in the story about Brandon Crisp that he was addicted to playing video games? The guy is 15 years old, I’d be willing to be that in a medical sense a pretty high percentage of kids could be classified as being ‘addicted’ to video games, just because a website about people wanting to play less World of Warcraft has been opened doesn’t mean that Brandon was addicted to playing Call of Duty 4.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why Reuters should have gotten a staff member that plays on their Xbox to write that story.

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Photo credit: Hermida