I remember when I got my first headphones at six. I called them "cans" even at that age. They were huge. The sound? Well, the sound was great because it worked. I didn't care about sound quality at six, I just wanted to listen to my Banana Splits album.
But as Steve Miller says, 'Time keeps on slipping into the future' and here we are with new listening and viewing devices and kids are listening to their favorite tunes or watching their videos with different devices than we had growing up and ear buds just don't seem to cut it anymore.
In 1983, companies spent $100 million marketing to kids. In 2011, they spent nearly $17 billion annually. Marketing firms and advertisers are looking to younger demographics, targeting tweens and younger children. This demographic has a lot of control over the flow of their parents' spending with statistics showing that eight to 12-year-olds spend $30 billion of their own money each year and influence another $150 billion of their parents' spending.
If this doesn't shock you, how about this? 42% of children under eight have a TV in their bedroom. 52% of all zero to eight year olds have access to a new mobile device like a smartphone, video iPod or iPad or tablet. In a typical day, one in 10 zero to eight year olds uses a smartphone, video iPad, iPad or similar device to play games, watch videos, listen to music or use other apps. And, they are doing that about 43 minutes a day. *
Kidz Gear has decided to tap into that market with an Apple version of their wired headphones for kids designed specifically for the iPod, iPhone and iPad.
This Apple-specific version of their Kidz Gear headphones feature a unique volume limiting technology so kids have a safe listening experience. It has an always-on safe volume which makes it safe for children of all ages. The maximum volume level is limited between 80dB and 90dB levels. To give you an idea of what those levels mean: everyday conversation or a ringing telephone is about 60 dB; restaurant chatter, 70 dB; heavy city traffic, an alarm clock at two feet away, vacuum cleaner or a garbage disposal at 80 dB; and, subway trains, motorcycles, lawn mowers and running workshop tools at about 90 db. The headphones are ergonomically designed just for kids with soft padded child-sized ear-cups and high-quality audio components for around $30 USD.
Kids can play, pause, skip a track and return to a previous track or hear the playlist that's currently active. But here's the interesting thing, the Apple Wired Headphones also have an inline microphone that can be used to record audio, answer the phone and issue voice commands to Siri or talk via Skype.
I'm not sure what those voice commands would be coming from a child to Siri or why you would want them to be able to do this, but for some reason I picture a Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory moment with fizzy lifting drinks.
