Son spends too much time on the computer?

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I need to inform my nephew that he had better learn computers better than his father or myself. He's not living up to his teenaged obligations.

Guess I really don't get the whole young versus old thing going on here. Anyone wanna 'splain?

Personally, I think you two are talking around one another. Age doesn't matter wrt knowledg but it does matter when it comes to wisdom.

Asp-z comes off as a teenage youngster but turns out he has at least 1 year of college so is much older than I thought when I addressed him earlier. (thought he was about 14 based on posts) He also has chip on his shoulder about being young or at least seems to based on how sensitive he is to being called young and defending youth. Being young is great BUT there is danger in thinking that you know everything at any age. When people reach a certain age (ususally in their 30s) MOST of the time, they realize how little they knew when there were younger and thought they knew everything. Asp-z simply hasn't reached that stage yet where he can differentiate between knowledge and wisdom. Age doesn't invalidate the knowledge... Only the wisdom.

...And then there are the old farts who still haven't developed wisdom so age isn't the only indicator of wisdom either It is just really, really rare to ever find a young person with great wisdom.

As I said before... It isn't about being right but about getting it right. THAT is the thing this post is really about.

Does allowing a person to obsess on their obsession to the exclusion of most everything else promote happiness and success, or do we limit our obsessions and seek some balance? Where is that balance?

I focused on my interests a lot as a child and teenager - increasingly to the exclusion of things like school. However, school was becoming more and more difficult for me and I wasn't receiving any support. At the first sign I understood something better than most I was thrown into advanced classes to sink or swim. This lack of support, I feel, did a lot more damage than the time I spent on my interests at any age.

I am not sure what to advise because I've never been a parent. I mean I would say don't deny him access to his interests at all - that's hugely stressful and speaking from experience being denied access to my interests (this happened growing up and in a long-term - abusive - relationship) simply meant I found ways to gain access anyway.

So complete denial is, I think, a bad thing. However much access he gets, just make sure he's supported and has help he needs when he needs it.

Very happy to agree with both kfisherx (who explained much better than I could) and Verdandi on this one.
EnglishInvader adds a good point too. (hey - Hertfordshire! Same here )

I'm in agreement with everyone who says you should let him use the computer/internet, but you should be there to explain what is and is not acceptable usage. From what it sounds like, he seems to be on the right track anyway. Plus, don't think of using the computer as a necessarily seclusive kind of thing, you two can share links and discuss sites you both like. It's good to be supportive of a special interest, it's even better to be involved. I was really lucky my mom was a computer person too, so I grew up using them and had my own laptop at age 12 (not so common 8 years ago). She would help me write programs, and take me to her work and let me fix some of her workmates pc's, etc., it was really fun.

As for the whole young vs. old thing going down in here, as a university student and IT person for said university, I understand why Asp-Z thinks most older folks are less proficient with computers. I've met many professors who can barely use email. And from my experience there is a higher percentage of young people who are comfortable with basic concepts(installations, internet usage, spyware/virus removal), but most don't delve any deeper than that. There's probably a similar proportion of truly technologically savvy young people as there are older people. But the older people that are tech-savvy, are in fact much more knowledgeable as a whole. I've learned tons from my comp sci professors, and especially my boss (who was kind enough to explain usenet to me XD).

There is a ridiculous amount to learn if one truly wants to understand modern computing, and seeing as us younger folks weren't around when it was first developed, we do have some catching up to do. Sure you can open up a nice little GUI editor and write some code without knowing the fundamentals, but all advancements are built off of the contributions of others before us, so understanding the evolution of computing is in fact beneficial. It's also fascinating.

My main (special) interest is computers/Internet.

I was into BASIC programming before I started high school. (I started high school in 1990.) I feel that I've had a head start considering how important computers have become in today's society.

However, I haven't had a paid job involving computers. I'm not sure if I could handle the stress -- a pity because programmers in the 1990s could fetch a decent salary.

I used to -- and still do -- spend several hours a day on the computer/Internet. However, lately I have been trying to have time-out away from the computer. If I'm by myself, that's hard to do. I would rather use my brain and mind using the Internet or playing a computer game than staring at a TV or the four walls.