Netflix is reinforcing the power of the parents to control what their kids are watching.
The lockdown implemented by many countries across the world is causing an internet strain. Internet traffic across the world is experiencing an unprecedented spike in its usage.
The lockdown mandates that all people should stay at home to prevent community transmission of the virus. Given such restrictions, people across all ages are forced to find ways to entertain themselves.
The go-to form of entertainment is online streaming of movies and series.
Netflix Kids Parental Control
The screen time of kids during this lockdown rises with the increase in internet usage. Naturally, the kids would get fatigued with the kiddie contents that they watch and end up venturing into other genres.
This tendency poses a lot of risk for the kids because of their quick absorption of new knowledge. As a way to control this, Netflix has given control to the parents as early as 2018.
Since that time, parents could already block out individual contents and titles which they find inappropriate for their kids to consume. This year, Netflix has bolstered that feature.
Parents may now completely remove age-inappropriate segments of the platform. In addition, the filters that will be used are based on country-specific ratings, which are more intuitive.
To ensure that parents really know what their children are actually consuming, Netflix has also added a ‘review profile’ feature.
Lastly, Netflix has also given the parents to control to turn off the ‘autoplay’ feature to prevent binge-watching of kids.
Internet Strain
In the United Kingdom, several internet service providers have said that they are seeing as much as a 60% increase in the usage of their services week by week.
This number is what they would realize in a span of a year. The average peak usage of the internet for people would be at night, and that would last for about four hours. Now, the peak lasts for about ten hours a day.
Nevertheless, the service providers have said that they are ready to take on the load as their equipment is fully ready.
Throttling Online Streaming Services
In order to curb such strain, several internet providers around the world have humbly asked online streaming services to do throttling. These companies include Netflix, Amazon, and Disney+.
Throttling basically involves streaming service companies to lower down the quality of the videos that they provide to their users.
Despite the acceptance of some companies of the throttling request, internet usage is still up. More and more artists and performers are turning to live streaming their talents at home for the entertainment of fans.
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