[thomnottom]

Have gone through the same thing. Actually banned my daughter from watching YouTube because she was focusing too much on watching strangers play video games instead of interacting with us (and sometimes even her friends). Things aren't perfect, but I've definitely seen an improvement.

[ralfhn]

My 5yrs old does exactly the same. We restricted video games to only Saturdays so now he watches random people play video games on youtube all week. We're going to ban Youtube as well at least during the weekdays.

[grumdan]

This complete speculation from my side, but I would think that playing video games themselves to be better (or less harmful) than just watching other players. If I had kids, I would be more likely to limit how much they can watch others play and let them play themselves more.

This is however hugely biased from having played a lot of video games as a kid and I felt it to be much more dynamic experience that may even help developing some mental faculties than passively watching anything.

[beachy]

Slippery slope! We're locked into this segmentation as well. There's no end to the rule making.

Our current position (which changes it seems every few weeks) is:

Rubbish stuff - 10 minutes per day - most youtube videos, especially vloggers in baseball caps doing Minecraft

TV - 20 minutes per day (exception because....as parents we both used to watch a fair bit of TV after school)

Worthy stuff - up to an hour a day - Nature documentaries - TED talks - youtube to research interesting things (currently Minecraft but only redstone)

I wouldn't wish enforcing this sort of regime on anyone.