Comment
Online games curse for students
By Joseph Christian (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-12-02 10:32
I stood at the blackboard, chalk in hand, poised to guide the class through an vocabulary exercise when once again I heard the snoring of Lucifer emanating from the back of the classroom. As I continued to teach, he continued to snore with his head planted squarely in the crease of his textbook with a black hoody covering his greasy head.
Luckily for me, Lucifer was not some force of evil but rather just the online name of one of my students who had spent the whole night in the confines of a smoky Internet bar playing a marathon session of the widely popular World of Warcraft.
I walked to the back of classroom in an effort to wake Lucifer but it was in vain. Every time he opened his eyes he would quickly fade back into his dreams of orcs and elves.
Lucifer was not my first encounter of a student who can't stay awake in class because they had been staring at a computer all night, and I am sure he will not be the last. It got me thinking, is online gaming a blessing or a curse for China?
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To give you an idea of how popular online gaming has become, consider that from 2003 till today online gaming revenue has surged 1,350 percent. Of course, for the creative hi-tech firms that make these popular online games, like NetEase, this surge is a dream come true, but for students like Lucifer, it is a curse that disrupts their life as much as alcohol disrupts the life of an alcoholic.
Considering the ramifications, what should be done about these Net addicts? Some Chinese parents have decided to send their child to special intensive camps to help wean them from the powers of the Net.
However, lately, many of these camps have come under close scrutiny for their unreasonably "harsh" methods. Maybe it would be better if parents had a more active role in teaching their kids how to responsibly use the Internet. But how can Chinese parents offer such guidance when the majority of them barely know anything about the Net?
In the end the best way to offer these Net addicts a lifeline might be through the very people they play these online games with, their peers.
I remember a few years back I had a student whose English name was Daniel. He was in his senior year at university and because of his Net addiction he was on the verge of not graduating.
Luckily for Daniel, he had some good friends that cared about him and after constant nagging were able to convince him to put away the mouse and keyboard for pen and paper. While he only ended up graduating by the skin of his teeth, Daniel still graduated. He also learned an important lesson for the rest of his life - how to correctly set his priorities.
While the problems of students like Lucifer and Daniel will surely not stop the onslaught of Net moguls like NetEase, perhaps these companies should spend a little of that hard-earned money to help their young customers learn how to play their games in a more responsible way.
