Raised on AI

MIT Technology Review's editor argues that parents must prepare children for the technological world that exists, even after social media harms prompted broad backlash. He describes moving from creating his first child's public footprint to protecting his second child's privacy and later removing much of the earlier material.

That shift mirrors policy and culture. The article cites Australia's social-media ban for children under 16, similar moves elsewhere, a U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a Texas age-verification law, school device restrictions, and enthusiasm among some young people for older technology such as the Sony Walkman.

The essay refuses a clean moral arc. Digital optimism was followed by experience of cyberbullying, body-image harms, compulsive use, and lost privacy. Yet the author's later decision to give his children more capable devices also supported independence, friendships, and participation in a world where physical and digital relationships overlap.

AI intensifies the tension because it is not merely a channel for media or peers. Chatbots and agents can answer, persuade, coach, imitate companionship, and act. Simple screen-time rules are insufficient; what matters is the role a system occupies in decisions, relationships, schoolwork, and identity.

Signal Desk's read: blanket bans may buy time but are not a preparation strategy. Children need staged access, privacy by default, age-appropriate boundaries, and repeated practice evaluating machine output. Adults need visibility without converting developmental experimentation into permanent monitoring.

The editor's decision to involve a magazine for teens and tweens points to a better policy habit: ask young people how they understand and use these systems. Their perspective does not remove adult responsibility, but rules without their experience will miss both harms and benefits.

The article also cautions against treating young people as passive recipients. The reported responses gathered for the issue were complex and thoughtful, suggesting that policy should recognize children's capacity for judgment while still accounting for developmental vulnerability and asymmetric product power.

This is an editor's letter for the September/October 2026 kids issue, not an empirical study. It mixes personal experience, clinical concern observed through the author's pediatric-nurse spouse, policy developments, and children's reported views gathered with Anyway magazine.

The household initially restricted social media and used flip phones, then adopted an iPhone and Apple Watch as the children grew. The framing is developmental: access and boundaries change with age and judgment.