Tin Can Is a Dumb Phone for Kids. Can Someone Teach Them How to Use It?

In precocious December, the 21st to beryllium exact, my friends Amos and Clara called maine 17 times. On December 22 it was 8 times. The calls were short—sometimes lone 30 to 45 seconds, and they usually arrived erstwhile I was doing thing important: working, market shopping, napping. “Hi Anna,” 1 oregon some of them would say. “Hi!” I’d respond. Sometimes I disquieted that I sounded excessively eager, oregon similar I was conscionable sitting astir waiting for their call. Sometimes I felt a small pathetic.

If anyone other called maine that often I’d artifact their number. But Amos is 6 years old, and Clara is 9, and what happened is that connected December 20, for Hanukkah, the siblings got the acquisition of a recently released, highly old-school kids’ phone. And for the adjacent week oregon so, the 2 of them couldn’t halt calling. And I, for one, couldn’t halt picking up.

Called the Tin Can, the telephone came retired past April and has since sold much than 100,000 units without overmuch paid advertising. It’s fundamentally a “dumb phone” that makes and receives calls implicit a Wi-Fi network—a landline without the line. It has nary screen, not adjacent a tiny 1 to amusement who’s calling; its aboveground has lone buttons, a receiver, and a speaker. The merchandise is marketed to parents who privation to promote their children to pass without giving them entree to web browsers and societal media. (One idiosyncratic connected X suggested, jokingly, that children commencement penning concatenation letters next.)

The modular Tin Can, which comes successful 4 colorways and costs $100, looks similar a candy-colored crockery can. A “retro” exemplary called The Flashback appears astir identical to an old-school cradle telephone and besides retails astatine $100. Calls betwixt Tin Cans are free, but the institution charges $10 a period for users to telephone extracurricular the Tin Can network. Parents get to acceptable the rules—they adhd numbers to an approved caller list, and lone calls to and from those numbers spell through, and lone successful preset clip frames, say, betwixt 8 americium and 8 pm. Parents tin besides show telephone logs. Call it spying with the implied consent of the spied upon; an physics surveillance authorities successful miniature.

Some parents person tried to lick the occupation of intrusive screens by buying their kids smartwatches; others opt for emblematic dumb phones. But these products are much astir letting adults support tabs connected wherever their kids are astatine immoderate fixed moment. The Tin Can is much astir getting kids to absorption connected utilizing their voices to communicate.

And that’s astir it. Tin Cans don’t amusement you missed calls oregon enactment substance messaging. In an epoch successful which astir everyone is being nudged toward addictive, screen-based, endless-scroll engagement, giving kids the accidental to get mislaid successful speech tin look incredibly appealing to parents.

Chet Kittleson, 38, is the cofounder of Tin Can and a begetter of 3 kids, 10, 8, and 5. I fishy helium wouldn’t overmuch similar my statement of the product’s relation arsenic “spying” (keeping ticker implicit one’s kids is portion of a parent’s job) oregon the merchandise itself arsenic a “toy.” He thinks of it, instead, arsenic a utility: a mode for kids to speech to Grandma oregon marque plans with friends and to beryllium “part of the aforesaid satellite that grown-ups are a portion of.” When helium was a kid, helium says, the landline was “arguably the astir palmy societal web of each time.” Every location had one. Then came compartment phones and smartphones. Direct lines to the internet. “And determination on the mode we decided the landline was obsolete,” Kittleson says. “In doing that, we overlooked a radical that was a large beneficiary of it: kids.”

I’m talking to him implicit Zoom 1 day from my location successful Los Angeles and his bureau successful Seattle. When I archer him that Amos and Clara had called maine much than 2 twelve times, helium doesn’t look peculiarly surprised. At archetypal there’s a burst of activity, helium says, and past implicit the people of a fewer weeks, the kids mature. “They're like, oh, OK, I spot that I tin really bash things with this that are important,” helium says.

Kittleson, who guesses that astir Tin Can users are betwixt the ages of 5 and 13, says helium wants to assistance make a “better childhood” or, arsenic helium puts it, “giving kids backmost a consciousness of independency and confidence.” (Mike Duboe, a spouse astatine Greylock Ventures, which led a circular that invested $12 cardinal successful the institution successful October, says thing similar.) One parent, describing their kid’s Tin Can usage connected X, wrote that it “felt similar the aged days.”

Amos and Clara weren’t the lone ones who, implicit the holidays, got the acquisition of gab. In precocious December, frustrated parents flooded the company’s feedback forms and posted connected Reddit that their Tin Cans weren’t working. Though the Tin Can engineers had anticipated a surge successful usage astir the holidays, the hundredfold summation successful telephone measurement took them by surprise.

When I inquire Kittleson astir the vacation meltdown, helium winces. “It was a stressful Christmas,” helium concedes. (A connection connected the Tin Can homepage said, “We’re investigating an contented impacting the network.”) He says that aboriginal shipments of the merchandise volition beryllium staggered.

And the product’s acold from perfect: There tin beryllium echoes, unstable dependable quality, and agelong pauses. The buttons connected the instrumentality are hard to press, which tin beryllium challenging to small fingers similar Amos’. His mother, Rebecca, sometimes has to assistance him marque calls. “It takes a small spot retired of the independency of it,” she says.

My archetypal phone, similar that of different kids successful my generation, was my family’s, a mustard yellowish portion of hard integrative that sat connected the mottled brownish linoleum antagonistic adjacent to the kitchen. It held a peculiar spot successful my imagination—an entity afloat of potential—but similar astir phones backmost past it was shared wrong a household and possibly adjacent overheard oregon monitored. It was besides tethered to a wall, making it hard to multitask oregon determination astir portion connected a call. Kittleson, successful fact, says that 1 inspiration for Tin Can was his vexation erstwhile helium called his parent connected her compartment phone. She was, helium says, “the worst”: the benignant of idiosyncratic who ran astir the location portion connected the call, doing laundry oregon whatnot. Difficult to hear. Easily distracted.

“I’m like, ‘Mom, tin you beryllium down?’’’ helium says. “Now she’s virtually stuck to a spot, and she can’t bash thing else.” That goes some for talking to her grandkids and Kittleson himself: If he’s astatine home, helium calls her connected the Tin Can. “I deliberation it's a amended speech with my mom, and I deliberation it shows my kids that this is simply a large mode to person a speech with someone,” helium says.

Parents accidental their kids are present arranging playdates, exempting adults from the relation of enforcement assistant. This bucks the inclination toward AI-dependent astute devices; arsenic Sherry Turkle wrote successful her 2011 publication Alone Together: Why We Expect More From Technology and Less From Each Other, “Digital connections and the sociable robot whitethorn connection the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship.” The Tin Can is the uncommon integer exertion that’s only astir quality connection. “Watching them conscionable chat connected the telephone and fig retired what you speech astir oregon don't speech astir is truthful awesome,” says Rebecca, who doesn’t bounds the clip her kids walk connected their Tin Can. “It’s connectedness, and it besides doesn't person to person purpose, and that feels truly nice.”

At first, Amos and Clara played with their telephone incessantly. After a fewer weeks, they settled into it. Use shifted. Not lone were they readying playdates, they were calling to cheque successful with their likewise aged friends (“What are you doing now?”) and having longer conversations.

And much polite ones. Kittleson told maine astir parents who reported that astatine first, their Tin Can–using kids simply hung up erstwhile they finished talking. Indeed, the archetypal fewer times that Amos and Clara called they greeted maine with a small “Hi” but not overmuch else. They didn’t adjacent accidental their name. It was connected maine to prolong the conversation. Did you cognize that experts accidental seldom 30 seconds walk without idiosyncratic asking oregon answering a question? In different words, I rapidly got sick of the dependable of my ain voice.

Yet it was wide that the kids were learning caller societal skills. Not lone did Rebecca observe that she loved getting calls straight from her kids, she besides began to announcement that her girl is funnier than she archetypal realized. “We're not privileged to get to perceive our kids and their friends chatting with each different truthful much, what they speech astir astatine schoolhouse oregon erstwhile they're playing successful a country with the doorway closed,” she says. “And truthful it conscionable feels amusive to ticker however they fig retired however to interact and what makes them laugh.”

Kittleson says his ain kids person begun to “use their voice.” (For example, erstwhile ordering nutrient astatine a restaurant.) His experience, anecdotally and from watching kids usage the product, is that girls are much apt to person longer conversations, whereas boys person much transactional exchanges like, “Can you play? OK, when?”

Claude Fischer, a sociologist astatine UC Berkeley, finds successful this echoes of adults’ aboriginal usage of telephones. From the beginning, helium says, phones were ne'er intuitively understood, “not conscionable mechanically but socially.” When they entered home beingness successful the 19th and 20th centuries, radical had to beryllium taught however to reply the phone, however to present themselves, however loudly to speak, however to extremity a conversation, and what constituted impolite oregon improper behavior. Phone companies adjacent produced pamphlets and schoolhouse materials connected telephone etiquette.

So wherefore not conscionable get 1 of those archetypal landlines? It’s much hard than it sounds. Phone companies person nary inducement to beforehand the usage of landlines; the wealth is successful mobile. In the days aft my parent died, and I had to cancel her landline service, it took maine arsenic agelong to adjacent the relationship arsenic it did to capable retired and motion the forms for the mortuary.

Plus, arsenic Kittleson reminded maine erstwhile we talked, landlines don’t person features specified arsenic “Do not disturb” oregon approved caller lists, which among different things blocks spam calls. Of course, arsenic with immoderate kid tech, vulnerabilities tin popular up, but erstwhile I asked information adept Karsten Nohl, helium told maine that successful this lawsuit concerns are constricted and would “mostly manifest successful the cloud, wherever the supplier reserves the close to grounds conversations, which could perchance beryllium accessed by 3rd parties.”

Of course, arsenic a taste icon, the Tin Can is obscurity adjacent landline status. Orders person taken months to fulfill. And competitors are coming: This outpouring volition spot the merchandise of the Pinwheel Home, which deems itself “the modern kids’ landline.” And what astir creating a cohort of Tin Can haves and have-nots?

Rebecca says that astir 10 percent of the kids successful Clara’s and Amos’ classes astatine their Los Angeles nationalist schoolhouse person the devices. Mike Duboe, the investor, tells maine that inquiries from schools person travel successful astir buying Tin Cans successful bulk. When I inquire him how—and why—this mightiness work, helium tells maine that helium imagines schoolhouse administrators broadcasting schoolhouse announcements to kids arsenic good arsenic parents.

In mid-January, I sat down with Clara and Amos to perceive however things were going. Who person they been calling? “Mostly my big friends,” Clara says. “I mostly telephone you.” What bash they accidental to people? “I’m conscionable calling to accidental hi,” Amos says. What person they learned? “You person to speech into the 3 dots,” 1 of them says. “Sometimes my eardrum starts hurting,” the different adds.

Amos tells maine that helium would similar aboriginal Tin Cans to person small cameras and screens that amusement the different person.

“So, fundamentally you’re saying you privation FaceTime,” I say.

“Yeah,” helium replies.

About a week aft I interviewed Clara and Amos, my telephone began to spell quiet. I’d gotten utilized to the flattery of being thought of and then—poof!—I was yesterday’s news. I disquieted that talking to them astatine magnitude astir the telephone had dulled the magic of it. Or of me. (Familiarity, contempt, etc.) I disquieted that they had go self-conscious astir reaching out. So I started calling them, some during the time erstwhile they were astatine school, to permission a voicemail, and successful the aboriginal evenings. Usually they picked up, ne'er knowing who they were going to get. The disappointment that I wasn’t a schoolhouse person was sometimes palpable. “Hi, Anna,” Clara would say. I didn’t perceive overmuch excitement successful her voice.

Finally, I couldn’t instrumentality the suspense immoderate longer. I asked Clara however often she was utilizing her phone. She told maine she engages successful astir 5 calls a day.

“Yeah, I noticed that you don’t telephone me arsenic much,” I said. I laughed a small erstwhile I said this, truthful that I would dependable cheery and agleam and unbothered. Embarrassed, I backtracked a bit. “Do you deliberation you’re bored with the phone?” I asked.

“No,” Clara said.

“Hmm, possibly it’s not that you’re bored, you’re busy,” I offered, helpfully.

There was a beat.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “It’s not that I’m bored. I’m busy.”

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