New gaming rules place onus on parents

[전영마]

Article for Tuesday (Sept 9th)
New gaming rules place onus on parents  

Parents will be encouraged to set online gaming curfews for their children, the government said Monday.



Currently, operators of online gaming sites who provide services to teenagers under 16 from midnight to 6 a.m. are subject to fines of up to 10 million won ($9,874).



At a joint news conference, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism said that parents should increasingly regulate how much time their children spend playing games.



'A mandatory six-hour ban starting from midnight for teenagers will now be lifted. Instead, parents will be able to pick time slots that they regard as appropriate to restrain their children from playing games,' said Kim Sung-byuk, an official from the gender ministry. 'This is in fact provides more freedom for parents and kids.'



He added that the change will also ease the burden on the Internet game industry, which has been complaining about tight gaming regulations governing children.



Under the new guidelines, game companies will be given a one-time grace period for any violations if they have never previously broken any regulations.



Experts say that the government is yielding to the game industry, which has been calling for deregulation measures.



'Under the new regulations, controlling children's Internet game addiction will become more difficult. This has potential to stop the torrents of complaints from parents and local NGOs,' said Yu Hong-sik, who teaches a media class at Chungang University in Seoul.



The 'shut-down' scheme is a new regulation implemented since November 2011.



Monday's announcement came after a series of talks between the two ministries following a meeting on deregulation at Cheong Wa Dae in March this year.



At the meeting, the cultural ministry said current restrictions on game industries were too harsh and demanded that the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family relax the conditions of the shut-down program.








QUESTIONS:

1) What is the 'shutdown policy about?'



2) How different is the new computer gaming policy to the current scheme?



3) How does the new one work? In what way does it benefit the parents? The gaming industry?



4) Would this modification work better? Why or why not?



5) Why do you think it's never easy for parents to prevent their kids from playing computer games?






VOCABULARY/EXPRESSION‎:

onus - A difficult or disagreeable responsibility or necessity; a burden or obligation