The broccoli thing depends on the kid. I loved broccoli as a kid.

Whether-or-not it and some other vegetables have a really unpleasant taste is a genetic thing.

https://distance.physiology.med.ufl.edu/the-science-of-supertasters/

It’s a tale as old as time. Growing up, your family tried to instill a love of broccoli and other leafy greens in you, but it never quite took. Now, you might be an adult who still doesn’t appreciate certain veggies, coffee or spicy foods. Perhaps you’d even go so far as to call yourself a picky eater. If so, have you ever considered whether you might be a supertaster?

Picky Eating

Many supertasters have a laundry list of foods they wouldn’t dare touch unless they were stranded on a deserted island — and even then, it would be a challenge. To their credit, there is a scientific reason behind their finicky food preferences. Scientists believe that many supertasters have the gene TAS2R38.

This particular gene increases a person’s perception of the bitterness in various foods and drinks. Many supertasters that have taken part in scientific studies often find that they’re extremely sensitive to a chemical called propylthiouracil (PROP). This chemical is often used in research to measure a person’s sensitivity to notes of tartness. Because PROP has an easily detectable bitter taste, supertasters often note an extremely bitter taste when given the chemical, more so than average or non-tasters.

Camouflaging Bitter Flavors by Overcompensating With Other Flavors

Broccoli and spinach may leave an overwhelmingly bitter taste in the mouths of supertasters, but that doesn’t mean they don’t understand the nutritional value veggies offer. To mask the bitterness, some supertasters add sweet, salty or fatty flavors to foods they wouldn’t eat otherwise. This makes certain bitter-tasting foods more palatable so supertasters can have their vegetables — and their nutrients too.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Easy-Bake-Ultimate-Electric-Oven-Playset-Kids-Toys-for-Ages-8-up/5512174576?classType=REGULAR

Easy-Bake Ultimate Electric Oven Playset, Kids Toys for Ages 8 up

CAUTION – ELECTRIC TOY: This toy has a heating element, which can result in burns.

I’m absolutely confident that I helped Mom in the kitchen long before 8, though. A relative’s toddler was helping make cookies the other month. Wasn’t putting the cookies in the oven, though.

A lot of services today do require a cell number for sign-up, as a form of “expensive ID” that one can’t just make more of.

My guess is that a lot of kids might be kinda conditioned to provide it to services, since these days, they’re probably already handing it over if they’re getting a Google account or something.

All this is assuming that the kid has a cell phone with service. I suspect that it’d be easier, from a technical standpoint, to keep a kid from cell service — which actually costs something and is harder to share — than Internet access.

Not a hard link, but first grade is normally 6-7 years old, so eighth grade is 13-14.

On timing, I’d say that unless you plan to live in wilderness somewhere and limit connectivity options, that it’s going to happen pretty quickly regardless of your position. Even if you don’t provide access to the Internet, once kids start going to school, I expect that they’ll make friends, and at least some of those friends are going to have Internet access, probably in a mobile form.

And phone-based WiFi hotspots and Bluetooth tethering means that if someone’s friends have some sort of cell service with unlimited data, as long as they’re around them, they can share an Internet access link, so can use their own WiFi-capable device, don’t need to share devices. I expect that used WiFi-capable devices are not going to be hard to come by, though I guess that a parent could try to forbid their kids to have one.

And once a kid’s location isn’t restricted to being around their parents all the time, for anyone in an urban setting, there are going to be foot-accessible places that provide WiFi access — like, everyone at school knows the local Starbucks password or whatever.

EDIT: On consideration, I don’t think that Starbucks actually passwords their WiFi service, but even for restaurants or shops or whatever that do and have guest WiFi, not a super high bar.

I can type 160wpm on a good day.

That’d be very fast. I mean, even without doing real-time composition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Blackburn_(typist)

The Guinness Book of World Records included her speed records amongst others in the “Typing, Fastest” category of the 1976[5]–1986[6] editions, where she was listed as able to “attain a speed of 170 wpm” and “maintain 145 wpm for 55 minutes”

Blackburn was popularly recognized as the “world’s fastest typist”[9][10] and made media appearances to exhibit her typing speed and the Dvorak layout, notably appearing in a 1985 episode of Late Night with David Letterman[9] and in a television commercial for the Apple IIc.[10]

I don’t know what Manga Plus is, but I assume that this isn’t actually complaining about the time so much as the amount of content, and using the time as a proxy.

I mostly can’t understand why people are so into “LLMs as a substitute for Web search”, though there are a bunch of generative AI applications that I do think are great. I eventually realized that for people who want to use their cell phone via voice, LLM queries can be done without hands or eyes getting involved. Web searches cannot.